AFarmefs 

Note Book 

C. E.D.Phelps 




Gass ^ cS /! / 
Book _L_51_ 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



^.12), (PUf^ 



A FARMER'S 
NOTE BOOK 



:^i^A' 



PHELPS 




RICHARD G. BADGER 

THE GORHAM PRESS 
BOSTON 



Copyright, 1912, by C. E. D. Phelps 



All Rights Reserved 






The Gorham Press, Boston, U. S. A., 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 



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A Farmer's Note Book 

January i. New Year's day ends the gun- 
ning season. Noisy Sagittarius and bounc- 
ing Capricornus are swept away by the wash 
from Aquarius' urn. The first snow-fall, 
however long deferred, is generally unwel- 
come to the farmer. No matter how neatly 
everything may have been packed and 
stowed, the mind goes afield for tools for- 
gotten on some neighbor's place, or jobs that 
might have been completed had open weath- 
er lasted longer. We look at the thermom- 
eter, hoping it will rise a few degrees, we 
scan the flakes, desiring their change to rain- 
drops. The comfortable old leather boots 
that have served so long will do no more, and 
rubbers must be worn all day long. Nothing 
else will keep out melting slush beyond an 
hour or two; nothing at least that I have 
ever tried. My grandfather was wont to 
recommend boiling one's boots in grease. 
This, he said would fix 'em, but he added 
that it did spoil one's socks for a week or 
two. Gaiters, so affected by the traditional 
English yeoman, will not serve for long; the 
snow gets into the shoes, and there melts at 
leisure. On the whole, an agriculturist may 
better accustom himself, as soon as may be, 
to the condition of Tytler's farmer. "Get 
us some supper, can't 'ee, lass?" he roared. 
"I'm half starved, and wet up to the knees 
like all day." 

5 



6 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

January 2, Climbed old maple, and 
sawed out what was once the principal leader 
— now a weak diverging limb. Of the thou- 
sands who have ascended trees for safety, 
sport, or espial, how many make a figure in 
history or fiction? Zaccheus, Charles II, 
Robinson Crusoe, Countess of Desmond — 
are there any more? Yet it compares favor- 
ably with many exploited athletics. 

No owner of land can be considered thor- 
oughly acquainted with it until he has 
climbed the principal trees upon it. A sur- 
prising difference is made by changing the 
angle of view from acute to obtuse. The 
cornfield that will bear being looked down 
on is a good one. Of course, other things 
being equal, the higher one ascends, the bet- 
ter; but much pleasure may be had at the 
modest altitude of 12 to 20 feet. 

Climbing irons, such as telegraph linemen 
use, and as were once employed by Tom 
Brown and East to rob the magpie's nest, 
are not trustworthy in green wood. A flake 
of bark into which the spur has been driven, 
may peel off as soon as weight is thrown on 
it, while a sudden slip into a crotch, both 
feet together, risks an ugly wound. A stout 
bit of rope, 12 feet or so, with a loop at one 
end, may be thrown over a limb from the 
ground, noosed and ascended. Many a tree, 
hopeless at bottom, is an easy ladder after 
the first ten feet. 

Great differences exist in the strength of 
trees. As a rule, those with strong bark, as 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 7 

lime, birch, and willow, have weak wood, 
and vice versa. The cherry is the most 
treacherous of all, a fair looking branch 
sometimes crushing in the hand like an egg- 
shell; the pin oak the strongest, even its dead 
twigs being tough as wire. I have known 
one of these, not thicker than a lead pencil, 
to bear a man's weight. Winter tree mount- 
ing is on some accounts preferable, especially 
if one seeks a view, for few are the trees in 
leaf where a good outlook can be had. But 
in summer one enters into the very heart of 
the tree, and lives almost detached from 
earth. The most hospitable hosts of this 
kind are those, which have, so to speak, suf- 
fered a disappointment in early youth, and 
lost their leading shoot. This causes them 
to throw out many side branches, which ulti- 
mately form a huge basket, where one may 
repose, and even sleep. 

January j. A neighbor asked this morn- 
ing ''Any more news of the trolley?" and re- 
newed dolor. In "Old Mortality", Claver- 
house is represented as pausing in his dis- 
course with Milnwood to look up Cuddie 
Headrigg's name in a list of the disaffected. 
"Let me see — 'Gumblegumption, indulged, 
sly, suspicions — Heathercat, field preacher, 
fanatical, dangerous. Ah, I have it now — 
Headrigg, Cuthbert, his mother a bitter pur- 
itan, himself a simple fellow, — might be 
made something of but for his attachment to 
— '. He paused, and glancing at Milnwood 



8 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

returned the paper to his pocket." 

I doubt the railroad agents and surveyors 
may go provided with something equivalent 
to this, describing those whose lands they 
seek. E. G. "A Poor and old; will yield 
readily. B. wealthy; approach with tact, or 
may put up stiff fight. C. likely to bluster, 
but will weaken if threatened with law. D. 
easily talked over; unreliable. E. An easy 
mark; believes all you tell him, but will stand 
to his word." Equipped with such a manual 
much can be done by a ready talker. I re- 
member one worthy assuring a neighbor 
"You'll never take another crop off this 
ground," and three seasons with their cor- 
responding crops, have since gone by. 

January 4. Looking at a white birch stick 
in the fire to-night, I was struck by the like- 
ness in the effect of fire and water. A line of 
flame crept slowly across the smooth white 
bark driving up a little wrinkle before it, like 
one of the lines left on sea sand by the re- 
turning waves. Great is the indestructibility 
of logs. I sometimes recognize on the fire a 
stick which I cut a week, a month, or even a 
year before. 

The approach of sleep is much like the 
freezing of water in pond or bowl. Faint 
spiculae dart from the sides, motes and dots, 
barely perceptible, swim in the midst. One 
might imagine the process not less grateful 
to the long unsheltered mere than to the 
merely longing brain; for as the one desires, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 9 

for the time being, to be defended from that 
thought which is its own component essence, 
so might the other seek a coat proof against 
the plunge of an icicle, formed of a like ele- 
ment. Slight agitation applied with judg- 
ment, will help the matter on. The introduc- 
tion of a finger will sometimes change a bowl 
of congealing water to a solid mass; a bit of 
ice slid in at the proper moment, will help on 
the water's freezing, and so will thinking on 
your latest dream help to induce slumber. 
Transparent and cold as are ice and sleep, 
nothing will keep brain and water safer and 
warmer; all glances from them, and naught 
stirs up mud or mood. The parallel holds 
to the last; for nothing can more resemble 
the rude awakening of a slumberer than the 
sudden breaking of ice, and nothing is more 
like a gradual and pleasant wakening than 
the melting thaw where beginning and end 
are alike indiscernable. 

January 5. Turning cold again after rain. 
Several years ago, when a long period of 
damp weather was succeeded by a sharp 
night, in walking through a wood road, I 
observed here and there among the russet 
leaves a white tulip or lily of ice. The crys- 
tals, rising from the steaming ground, had 
been pressed by the stiffening leaves into 
curves and convolutions resembling petals. 

Frost and drought are not unlike in their 
results, or at least their effects. A winter 
meadow, bare of snow, but frozen hard, is 



lo A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

not very dissimilar to the same meadow dur- 
ing a dry spell after haying. Color is gone, 
growth is short, stones show like land turtles, 
the soil is impenetrable, the wheel of nature 
is on a dead point. Only the hedgerows, in 
either case, retain some life and color. You 
look at the foot hole pits in the ground, 
made when you rode that way last fall or 
spring, as the case may be, and wonder that 
the ground would ever have been soft 
enough to receive such impressions, while 
that pools of water could ever have stood up- 
on it seems impossible. The earth, like the 
face of a frightened cowboy, is pale to the 
obliteration of its natural tan; and, again like 
the cowboy, this only departs when he draws 
rein at home. Then it is good to see, even in 
winter, how the tints hasten back, and brown 
skin and stubby beard assume their natural 
hues; for even in winter there is color, when- 
ever a spell of mild moisture comes. 

January 6. Someone has said that a farm- 
er can often tell trees apart by their winter 
aspect, when he works most among them, 
who would be puzzled by their leaves, at a 
time when he is busied in the fields. I some- 
what doubt this; yet if all men wore thick 
muffling garments of green, even if different- 
ly tagged and fringed, for half the year, 
would it not be easier to distinguish African, 
Hindoo and Caucasian when stripped? 

Most trees — all the fruit trees — blossom 
early in spring. Oak, maple, elm, birch, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK ii 

beech, this last very modestly, — hickory, 
gum. The lime and plane come later. The 
tulip tree excels both in magnitude of trunk 
and blossom. I have in mind a fine specimen 
twelve feet in circumference, eighty feet high 
and covered every year in early June with 
great yellow-green cups. Had they the color 
of quince or apple, such a tree would be one 
of the most splendid objects in Nature. 

Early in July come the chestnuts, when 
their pretty golden bloom may be distin- 
guished a mile away bursting from among 
the dark green woods, as though some gigan- 
tic Gambrinus held up his well loved goblet 
from the shades. This, I think, is the last 
tree to bloom, for that uncanny shrub, the 
witch-hazel, hardly counts. Acorn and 
chestnut come nearly together in ripening, 
and are not unlike in size, but the former has 
much the longer preparation for its fall — 
perhaps because its burr, as Thoreau found, 
is inside. 

January 7. Cutting bushes after storm. 
Noticed how persistent are the effects of the 
great ice blizzard of February 21, 1902; 
nearlythree years have passed, but the traces 
can be seen on every hand, and are like to be 
seen for twenty years. Most of the isolated 
chestnuts lost a limb then, some nearly all, a 
few branches yet dangle and swing by a 
strand of fibres, and a throng of new sprouts 
push from their stubs. In one place where 
two heavy oak trees had fallen on young 



12 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

saplings, the latter, bent almost to the earth, 
were still alive and calling for help, which 
Nature could only bring by the decay of the 
superincumbent weight. I pulled one or two 
out, but like long time prisoners, they had 
lost their spirit and straightened up but little. 
One sweet gum, liquid amber or bilsted, thus 
bent down had lost on its trunk the corking 
ridges which feature that tree. Eccentrici- 
ties are not developed under heavy strain. 

Twenty years ago, nearly, we cut down a 
dead pine which fell on a young white oak, 
and bent it over. The weight was soon re- 
moved, but the oak did not straighten. It 
was then about thirty feet high, and the top 
of its arch some seven feet from the ground. 
Every year since it has braced up a little, and 
now rises at an angle of about 60" sprouts 
rising from the upper side, a rod or so of its 
top rotted off. Alas, it stands in the trolley's 
patli, and another year will probably end my 
observations. 

January 8. Have often wondered why 
tramps should ask for things which they 
throw away as soon as unobserved. Yet how 
often do we seek bread or shoes for our 
souls, and then, on leaving the presence, cast 
them behind the next hedge. 

Trollope says it is a dangerous mental 
practice to imagine ourselves better than we 
are. And Meredith says it is an even more 
dangerous mental practice to imagine our- 
selves worse than we are. The fact that we 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 13 

compare ourselves with others in the first in- 
stance and not in the second, may have some- 
thing to do with it. The danger might be 
done away if, under the circumstances, im- 
agined by Trollope, we endeavored to carry 
our ideal into execution, and amid those set 
forth by Meredith, to keep our figment pure- 
ly speculative. But perhaps a worse habit 
than either is that of being sorry for our- 
selves. We may be, and generally are, rigid 
toward others up to — or down to, a certain 
point; we blame them severely for ignorance 
awkwardness, cowardice, and the like, until 
we discern, or are told, that they are natur- 
ally deficient in mind, when all strictures 
cease. But when we are sorry for ourselves, 
we cease to blame ourselves; when we cease 
to blame and begin to think that we should 
not be held to the same standards as others, 
self-control is gone, and from that time our 
progress is on a steep down grade. 

January g. Obstinacy of inanimate ob- 
jects. A wheel mounts a stone, and then 
slips off to one side, without the onward im- 
petus descent would have given; you cut 
down a dead weed, and the stem sticks in the 
ground, and has to be plucked away by hand 
before the spot is cleared. "When you fight 
with a Russian", said Frederick the Great, 
"you have to kill him first and knock him 
down afterwards". 

Of active courage, pugnacity and energy 
will make a very fair imitation; of the pas- 



14 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

sive sort, mere sluggishness of mind will 
serve. For it can hardly be doubted that 
many a man who has gained credit for cool- 
ness in time of sudden danger did so because 
he did not think quickly enough to be fright- 
ened; by the time he realized the peril, it was 
past. Whereas the nervous, highly strung 
individual, taking in the danger as readily as 
everything else, fled before it, mentally, even 
more rapidly than the foe advanced, in a 
manner not to be overlooked or mistaken. 
Goethe's "seeing red" during his attack of 
cannon fever at Valmy was most likely a 
provision of nature for enabling him to dis- 
play reckless courage, much in the same way 
as a tendency to corpulence will — for a time 
— enable a gourmand to avoid the horrors 
of dyspepsia. By the way. Creasy, in com- 
menting on this episode, says Goethe was 
then In early youth; the fact being that he 
was well turned of forty. 

January lo. I have once or twice alluded 
to the ice storm of 1902. During a freezing 
rain many years before, a small native hen 
who persisted in roosting on a bush out of 
doors, instead of sharing the hen-house with 
the Bramas, was covered with what Dante 
calls a "vislere dl cristallo", very closely 
moulded to its contour, but not quite touch- 
ing eye and nostril, though attached to comb 
and beak, yet when relieved of her armor, 
she did not seem a bit the worse. 

The wondrously intricate defensive arm^ 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 15 

or of the Middle Ages contrasts strongly 
with their simple and rudimentary weapons. 
Skill and ingenuity were taxed to the utmost 
to form an outer artificial skeleton, so to 
speak, only of steel instead of bone, fitted, 
clasped and jointed in a manner comparing 
not ill with Nature's own handiwork, shoes 
and gauntlets which would keep out anything 
but water, helmets which were a perfect de- 
fense if the wearer could but breathe in 
them. And while all this was achieved, not 
even excluding a considerable degree of dig- 
nity and grace, sword and spear, arrow and 
sling remained almost unchanged from Ju- 
lius Caesar down to Coeur de Lion. The 
great superiority of the English bowmen, of 
which so much has been said, consisted chief- 
ly in the general excess of their bow-staves in 
weight and strength over the Continental 
ones, while their arrows were almost small 
spears. The elaborate cross-bow, with its 
squared or quarrel head, devised to prevent 
the bolt rolling sideways from the stock, is 
perhaps the only exception to the general 
simplicity of missile weapons, and its success 
was not on the whole encouraging. 

January 11. There is a peculiar kind of 
sky — large mackerels, so to speak — leaden 
pear shaped clouds following each other in 
slow succession — which always brings a 
Scotch battle to mind. May not some far 
away ancestor, as he fought or fled at Largs, 
Harlaw, or Pinkie, have been struck by such 



1 6 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

aspect of the sky In an Interval of stress, and 
sent it down to me ? 

"Neighbor King's stack is on fire!" For 
once apprehension is sufficed. Away you fly 
in the direction indicated, work and business, 
pain and pleasure alike forgotten in the ex- 
citement of a servile Insurrection. Arrived 
on the scene, you find the usually docile and 
useful slave at bay, surrounded by half a 
dozen of his hereditary masters, beating 
down the stack where he lies entrenched, car- 
rying it away by forkfuls, and throwing the 
smoking bunches among green bushes, into 
moist corners, anywhere the rebel will not 
find an ally. Buckets of water are dragged 
from the well and flung on the points where 
an outbreak is most to be dreaded, while 
every now and then a fierce puff and flash 
of heat makes all give back. "How did It 
start"? "Who saw it first"? "A good thing 
the wind blew this way!" Our conversation 
is elemental and monosyllabic, as becomes 
the time. Well do we know there Is no help 
In the firemen of the distant town; before 
they can arrive, we shall be victorious or 
worsted. At last the fray Is over, the bond- 
man lies chained and prostrate again, send- 
ing forth a few expiring gasps, and we sep- 
arate avowing our intention to keep a stricter 
rule for the future. 

January 12. Mending Clifton barn. The 

flooring of the east mow one thick and 

trongly spiked plank excepted — was torn 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 17 

out for firewood by some of the Irresponsible 
tenants who Hved there during the nineties, 
and we are now replacing it. The usual dis- 
tance of floor beams apart is two to three 
feet, here it is nearly five, so we have to put 
in double planking. Inch hemlock over five 
eighths pine. The hemlock is green frozen 
stuff, and we have to kneel on a short bit of 
the pine while working, lest we get rheuma- 
tism in the knees. 

It has been observed that in most under- 
takings calling for endurance of mind and 
body, the leaders generally hold out better 
than the subordinates. And, to some extent, 
this is true on the farm. Either the laborer 
Is more subject to ailments, or more apt to 
complain of them, than the "boss". Some say 
this Is because he don't know so well how to 
take care of himself; others, that being gen- 
erally younger he has not had time to grow 
into a veteran; others, that his health and 
strength being his only stock In trade, he Is 
more alarmed at their possible failure, and 
more Inclined to hold forth upon It, than one 
who has something put by against a rainy 
day. It Is of course Impossible to tell how 
much pain one person suffers as compared 
with another, even from anything so definite 
as a crushed finger; much more from invisi- 
ble Internal pains, like dyspepsia or head- 
ache. But It maybe generally stated that when 
a stout young fellow spends two days In bed 
on account of an alleged toothache he Is rath- 
er overdoing It ; also that when the opportune 



1 8 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

occurrence of a holiday causes swift recovery 
from grinding pain, doubts may be felt as to 
the severity of the complaint. 

January /j. Took load of hay to neigh- 
bor K. It is an old device with those that 
sell hay to take it to market on a damp 
threatening day; for the dry stuff out of the 
barn absorbes moisture from the air, and 
reaches the scales many pounds heavier than 
it left the farm. I have also heard a laborer 
who came to us from Pennsylvania relate 
that in the region where he worked the farm- 
ers would spend much time adjusting the 
forkfuls of hay as they were pitched on the 
load destined for market, so that the heads 
of timothy should show on the outside as 
much as possible; and this improved its ap- 
pearance so much as a dollar a ton beyond 
that tossed on anyhow. 

January i/f. Journeying along the banks 
of the Delaware I observed what a theatrical 
appearance has dirty old ice sprinkled with 
fresh white snow. 

The four spiritual quarter-days; Walpur- 
gis, Midsummer, Hallowe'en, Christmas. 
While they do not exactly correspond in dis- 
tance to the old days of settlement, being 
strained rather than rent, yet there is some 
likeness. Walpurgis, (April 30) as all 
know, is the festival of the evil spirits, and 
then is kindled the bale-fire — the flame of 
Baal — round which fiend and witch foot it 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 19 

together. Midsummer Eve has more cheery 
associations. Then troop the fairies, those 
failed divinities, Kelpie and Lurley are but 
shrunken Naiads, gnome and kobold Her- 
cules or Mercury rubbed down. 

Hallowe'en brings on the harmful, un- 
necessary ghost, the laundress semblance, the 
mirror awaiting Daguerre, the prophetic 
mandrake or its humble imitator, the cab- 
bage stump, the apples of Eden, upborne by 
the Deluge, and Ariadue's clue, flung into the 
Cretan kiln. Lastly, Christmas rises from 
the unearthly to the heavenly; then only an- 
gels are heard, and that with its solstitial 
comrade hath gentle Shakespeare celebrated 
in his verse, leaving the more fearsome out- 
breaks occurring in Spring and Autumn to 
the treatment of dour Scot and misty Teuton. 

January 75. The Stoics are well named. 
They entered not the house of truth, only 
dwelt in its porch, but the porch of the Greek 
temple was its chief glory and beauty. Their 
ideal was attainable by man, and dignified in 
its ignoring of circumstances. Christ's teach- 
ing went half way with that of the Stoic, then 
overwhelmed it. "Fear not them which kill 
the body, but are not able to kill the soul", 
was repeatedly said by Epaphroditus' slave; 
but the next sentence "Rather fear him" 
goes far beyond. On the other hand while 
"Lay not up for yourselves treasures on 
earth" seems to strike at the root of the Ep- 
icurean doctrine, what follows of treasure in 



20 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

heaven confirms and sublimes It. 

January i6. Walking over field noticed 
the empty cartridge shells of the December 
gunners. These cases of brass and paper al- 
ready rusting and rotting, compare as ill 
with the Indian's imperishable stone arrow- 
head as someone says the tin-can of modern 
civilization does with the pottery of Kurium. 

City people who come into the country, (a 
few artists and a very few well behaved peo- 
ple excepted) do so either to pilfer, to pol- 
lute, or to destroy. Under the first head, come 
the snappers up of fruit, flowers, nuts, and 
ferns; under the second, the picnickers; un- 
der the third, the fishers, hunters, and fire- 
raisers. Perhaps they do not always propose 
these ends to themselves, but the results just- 
ify the above statement. Who has not seen 
cultivated berries and blossoms snatched up, 
nay, perhaps, dug up, with trowel afore- 
thought? How many a pretty woodland 
nook more resembles a pig-sty after the de- 
parture of a jolly lunch party, who have lit- 
tered it with melon rinds, papers, tin cans, 
and bottles. And how often is a dangerous 
fire set by persons who run away and leave 
some one else the task of putting it out? And 
these things are done by nice young people 
without an ill word or thought, except for 
the owner of the property, should he appear 
with remonstrance. When country people 
come to town, it is either to transact business 
or to look at shows, for which they pay good 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 21 

money. Yet rustics, boors, and the like, 
have the name of being deficient in civility. 

January ij. Several trees which were 
burst by the frost blow last winter now show 
their wounds where sap has oozed from the 
rupture during last summer, and stained the 
bark. I heard two or three of them go at the 
time. One, I remember, a large ailanthus, 
thus sounded one night when the thermom- 
eter reached 17° below zero, like a log 
which after holding a long time suddenly 
splits under great strain from wedges. The 
process is not very clear, but would seem to 
be just the reverse of a tub or jug bursting 
from the expansion of ice within. 

January 18. Drawing up wood. Several 
sticks containing hibernating- ants, the large 
black kind. It is said that the Maine log- 
choppers, when bilious from long feeding on 
pork and beans, used to eat these insects for 
the formic acid they contain. I have tried it 
myself, biting off the abdomen, and rejecting 
the head and thorax; and I remember they 
tasted like sorrel. 

The only hibernating mammal I have ever 
seen in this neighborhood is a long tailed 
mouse, dark above and yellow beneath, sev- 
eral specimens of which I have dug out of a 
gravel bank, two or three feet from the sur- 
face. 

The city papers, without which what 
should we do, are full of advice to us In 



22 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

these days concerning the fly. "Down with 
him, show no mercy, kill, take, slay!" they 
cry concerning the insect which Domitian was 
blamed, even in heathen times, for putting to 
death, and which Uncle Toby spared with a 
kindly word. But admitting that their coun- 
sel is fundamentally sound, its details are 
open to criticism. "The fly's only breeding- 
place is in filth" they cry. "Disinfect, clean 
up, cart away without a moment's respite. 
Let your cattle have a piece of woods to run 
in, where they can be free from these tor- 
ments", etc., etc. Now perhaps filth may be 
the fly's nursery in the city, where it is the 
only soft moist place he can find, but the re- 
verse is the case in the country, where he 
much more affects the open fields than the 
barn's vicinity. And as to the woods, I have 
often noticed in riding through them that the 
stinging fly at least — Stomoxys calcitrans — 
was more frequent there than anywhere else. 
Once In riding through a small piece of 
woodland, not above ten acres in extent, I 
killed nine flies of the order referred to on 
my horse's neck. 

January ig. The purple sap of green 
chestnut wood stains the axe blade more than 
any other. Cedar, pine and sassafras can all 
be told by their odor when cut, and drying on 
a dead stick turn It bright green. This last 
wood, by the way, seems to have formed a 
large part of the cargoes sent home to Eng- 
land by the early settlers. Our ancestors had 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 23 

an exaggerated belief In its medicinal vir- 
tues; a belief which in Charles Lamb's time 
only lingered among the sweeps, whom he 
described as delighting in sassafras tea, 
which they called "Saloop". 

Has anybody living ever seen a man-trap? 
One reads of them in the old books, and 1 
have heard of an eccentric Englishman who 
made a collection of them; but they appear 
fabulous as the Minotaur, and I suppose he 
who set them now would be detested as his 
owner. Yet a hundred years back they seem 
to have been considered quite the proper 
thing. See Jane Taylor, "That large ring of 
Iron, which lies on the ground, with terrible 
teeth like a saw". 

Said Bobby — "The guard of our garden is 

found. 
It keeps wicked robbers in awe". 

No doubt then as to who was wicked. But 
now, along with the man-trap, have gone the 
teuter-hooks and the broken glass which I 
have often seen topping fences and walls fif- 
ty years ago. But bitter as the outcry would 
be against them now, there is a mode of de- 
fense which Includes the possibilities of harm 
they all possess, which can Inflict most ghast- 
ly wounds, which yet is turned out by the 
mile from many a mill, and sold In every 
State of the Union with scarcely a word of 
protest, at various prices and in various 
shapes. I refer to barbed wire, that Ameri- 



24 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

can hybrid between the man-trap and the 
hedge. 

January 20. Passing over land lately 
drained, observed the course of the ditches, 
both mains and laterals Indicated by the drier 
and more crumbly earth over them; so that 
from a balloon one could have drawn a com- 
plete map of the system. On another field, 
now in sod, one of the drains can be traced 
by a narrow line of timothy, growing upon 
it, not above a foot wide, swamp grass and 
rushes on either side. 

This last meadow has a curious diversity 
of soil, some seven by five hundred feet, 
about two thirds of Its width Is sandy, then 
comes a strip of stiff loam, and the rest Is 
black muck full of bowlders large and small 
bottomed by tough yellow clay. The stones 
rest on this as on rock, the largest leaving no 
hollows. Presumably the muck has formed 
around the stones since they were deposited. 
My efforts at draining this spot have not 
been very successful, as may be seen. Water 
as well as stone lies on the hard pan, so that 
only the depth of ditch sunk into the clay af- 
fects k. Perhaps nothing changes the char- 
acter of a piece of land like thorough drain- 
age unless It be the felling of a forest; and 
this Is solely destructive. It will be remem- 
bered that the most beneficlent task Goethe 
could devise for his reformed Faust was the 
reclamation of a great salt marsh. If the 
Hackensack meadows had been In Holland, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 25 

undoubtedly they had been ditched and sown 
ere this. 

January 21. There is an oak beside the 
wood road on which a flat fungus grows 
every summer, at the same place, about five 
feet from the ground. It appears in August, 
lasts through the fall, drops off in winter, 
and a dark spot marks the bark until warm 
weather. At the root of another tree a large 
pink fungus has appeared for several sea- 
sons. 

There is an orange-colored fungus which 
springs up in drooping clusters, not unlike 
sponges in form, at the roots of cherry-trees. 
This also is recurrent for years together, 
though not perennial. Another, which I have 
observed growing in, or rather grown 
through by thick grass, is of a whitish spec- 
kled hue, resembling the breast of a thrush, 
as large, or larger, than an ordinary bucket, 
and apparently held up, disconnected with 
the earth, by the hundred or more stems 
which pierce it through as the twigs pierce a 
wasp's nest. Then there is the carrion fun- 
gus, the asphalltian, which draws flies like 
spoiled meat. And one more house variety 
I remember, during a very hot damp spell 
developed suddenly in an old couch left in a 
dark and musty basement. So rapid was its 
growth, enlarging from the dimensions of an 
apple to those of a pumpkin within a few 
hours, that it split and burst the covering of 
the lounge in a manner surprising to behold. 



26 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

As though witch-craft had inhered, couch 
and fungus were shortly committed to the 
flames, without any effort to ascertain its 
species, which, at this distance, seems rather 
a pity. 

January 22. The mediaeval king kept his 
place by balance; his underlings by grip. And 
between them they rode that patient horse, 
the people, hard and far. Still, it should be 
remembered that the trained horse with a 
rider can generally beat the unburdened wild 
one. If there had been no kings in history it 
would have been necessary for the poets to 
invent them; so essential is it to the well-be- 
ing of humanity to have some one above 
them who can neither be blamed nor pun- 
ished. Let him who doubts this consider if 
the Great Republic has not an equivalent 
sovereign, though his name be neither Rich- 
ard nor Robin. When the old-time king could 
not keep his seat, or hold the rein, he fell, as 
did Alfonso from Bavieca; and Bivar arose 
to fill his place. So fell the luckless Seconds 
of English history — Edward, and Richard, 
and James — and so sprang a lawful heir, or 
an aggrieved noble, or a discontented son-in- 
law into the saddle. "If our master be not 
brave and wise, we will choose another" 
cried the nation in effect, "but a master we 
must have". 

January 2^. Mr. N. is carting blue shale 
upon his roads. No stone disintegrates more 
rapidly than the red shale. I have seen great 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 27 

blocks of it carted into a street, which in six 
weeks were reduced to small cubes like dice 
and in six more had become sticky clay. The 
blue variety, however, is harder, and will re- 
main gritty a year or so. 

The track on a dirt road changes about 
like the fashions. For weeks, or perhaps for 
months, be it winter or summer, the wagons 
will keep to one side, wearing deep ruts, or 
crushing all into fine dust. At last something, 
a stalled wagon, a fallen branch, even a brick 
dropped from a load, will compel, or at least 
induce a turn out, and forthwith all vehicles 
take the long, neglected, weathered, perhaps, 
grass-grown side of the way, and keep to it 
for a long term. Of course, the changes are 
more frequent and rational in spring, when 
the frost is coming out, and a quag on one 
side may exist with very fair travelling on 
the other. Again, a bad boulder which every 
one strikes and no one will pull out, just 
showing in the highway, will keep travel 
where only the wheels will hit it for perhaps 
twenty years. It has been said that a horse 
will not tread on you if he can help it, but 
neither will he tread on a large stone if he 
can help it, and slave as he is to us in many 
ways, his persistence in this and some other 
points, gains the day oftener than we sup- 
pose. Most likely the Hebrews took their 
own paths toward the pyramids. 

January 24. Our florist has tried nitrate 
of soda on his carnations, and says that 



28 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

though they grow large and fine, yet they 
would not keep after cutting, decaying the 
next day, when he had to make them good at 
a sacrifice. But even muck cannot always be 
relied on. 

Muck is sometimes, perhaps most fre- 
quently, used to signify barn-yard refuse. 
The Man with the Muck-rake of whom we 
have heard so much, in late years, after his 
long slumber in Bunyan's Allegory, drew to 
himself with that tool the sticks, straws, and 
small dust of the floor. But another use of 
the word is as a synonym for peat, from 
which it differs little, save that the latter may 
be one step nearer coal. Forty years ago, 
the stuff was much cried up for application to 
sandy soils, and competing with manure. 
Winter after winter we used to go to the 
swamp of a neighbor whom we paid twelve 
and a half cents a load, cut up the frozen sod 
into squares, pry it off, and then dig out the 
black cheese-like muck to a depth of perhaps 
two feet, when water was reached. It was 
then carted to dry land nearby, piled, and 
left to weather for six months or so; by that 
time it had become dry and powdery, and 
was either applied directly to the land, or 
mixed with manure. Many a day have I 
spent in the labor, yet I do believe it was 
mostly wasted time, and that only by apply- 
ing it as thickly as the existing soil could any 
good have been done. 

January 25. Snow began yesterday and 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 29 

this morning a veritable blizzard has set it. 
Drifts, bitter cold, high wind, cars stopped. 
''Though our silence be drawn from us with 
cars, yet peace". Twelfth Night. The first 
time I ever saw the word "blizzard" was 
during the campaign of 1872, in a satire on 
Carl Schurz ; wherein he was said to give the 
foe 

"Full five fingers of buckshot. 
And then reload for the next blizzard". 

Here it is evident that a charge of shot had 
been the meaning of the word up to that 
time. But it soon after came to mean as at 
present. To take another case, Graft, in the 
sense of extra-legal gains by city officials, has 
so completely overwhelmed the original 
meaning, viz: the transference of a living 
branch or cutting from one tree to another, 
that it may be doubted if many remain who 
know the word's original significance. So 
in a recent tale the boy who heard two of his 
elders refer to some young hircines sporting 
on the rocks nearby as "kids", interrupted 
them with the statement that "them wasn't 
kids; them was little goats". It were inter- 
esting to speculate whether a word ever 
changes to slang before its adopted children 
outnumber those lawfully its own. Thus, are 
there only of late years more corrupt, or at 
least venal municipal officials than work- 
ing gardeners? Did the use of "kid" 
above noted (and it is not new, it 



30 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

existed, with an affix, more than a hun- 
dred years ago) only begin when the 
young of humans outnumbered those of cap- 
rines? Did the metaphorical sense of "cut- 
ting a stick" first spring to life when real 
travellers became more numerous than dis- 
appointed lovers? And, to take one of those 
rare instances where a word has gained by 
extension, was the term "witch" only 
changed from a foul insult to a pretty jest 
when the roll of charming girls grew longer 
than that of old hags believed to be in league 
with the devil ? 

January 26. To town on wood sled. 
Snow, like the sea, levels distinctions. Man- 
ners are laid by; children ask for rides, nay, 
take them without asking, and pelt you, who 
would not think of it during the many 
months, when wheels prevail. Now come 
forth old mossy backs from Fresh Ponds, 
and Black Horse, in ancient sledges with low 
runners, high backs resplendent with blue and 
yellow rails, and absurd little dashboards, 
which look as if they might go back to Berk- 
ley and Carteret. Now and then one sees a 
pung hastily knocked together from green 
saplings and rough boards, and the depot 
hacks are fitted with bobs. The sleigh-bell's 
voice has drowned the motor man's gong, 
the auto's horn, the bicyclist's whistle, and 
all goes dancing by the stalled trolley-car, 
like a tribe of Indians who have gained tem- 
porary advantage over the strenuous and in- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 31 

exorable white man. 

January 27. The place where chickens 
fluttered through the snow is marked by the 
slaps of their wings on either side, but with 
pinions distended so that each feather cuts 
the snow separately, not with a solid stroke. 
Is this how they beat the air? Or does the 
snow trip them and make them strike awry? 

The gait of men, as well as that of birds 
— and I suppose the progress of a gallinace- 
ous fowl might be termed its gait — is much 
affected by circumstances. The farmer jogs 
or plods, the soldier strides, the sailor rolls, 
the maiden trips, or used to do so In the days 
before she took to offering man her sincerest 
flattery. The ragged recruits of Falstaff 
marched wide between the legs, remember- 
ing their recent fetters. The tailor is knock- 
kneed, the smith bow-legged, the savage toes 
in, the boatman shuffles. Dancer and thief 
are light of foot, cook and mason ponderous. 
None can for long disguise his Spiiren, to use 
that admirable German term so wanting to 
our language, while his accustomed environ- 
ment remains; but let It suddenly change, as 
with the fowls above, and the deft runner 
may become a clumsy swimmer, the trudg- 
ing lout a daring and skillful skater. We 
shall never fly with wings; the swing-shelf 
men have settled all that for us; but If we 
did, perhaps the worst on earth might be the 
best In heaven. 



32 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

January 28. The deep snow has put a 
stop to fires in the woods, one of which I 
found and extinguished a few days ago. It 
was about eight feet across, burning briskly 
away among dead leaves and spreading in 
all directions. It was, of course, easy to ex- 
tinguish a fire of this size; and having done 
so, I made after some boys who had just left 
and upbraided them. They, of course, de- 
clared it was the work of "some other fel- 
lers", a thing hard to believe when the flame 
was so recent.^. 

January 2g. Stages of travel. Storming 
through the world, crossing the continent, 
traversing the town, walking in the garden, 
pacing the room, tossing in bed, wandering in 
mind. 

January jo. Plants as well as animals 
seem to perish before the advance of civili- 
zation, even when not directly attacked. The 
Spinning-vine or Hartford fern, formerly 
abundant in swamps hereabout, has utterly 
disappeared. And the ground pine, a small 
evergreen of upright growth, is rapidly dis- 
appearing. Could only find a few very small 
shoots this year in a place where it once grew 
thickly. Of course, both of these were gath- 
ered for decorative purposes, but one would 
not suppose that this would have annihilated 
them within thirty years. 

January 57. The chopping-block is a tree 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 33 

turned traitor, one who becomes an instru- 
ment of the tyrant's cruelty upon his fellows 
to prolong his own miserable existence. 

February 1. The reason folk frequently 
lament the loss of friends less than the loss 
of property is that the former is inevitable 
and the latter is not, at least to our represen- 
tatives. 

Old Age — get thee hence, thou shipper in- 
to the land of stumbling and weariness, of 
fear and favors. So far as thou art tolera- 
ble or admired, it is because thou art not al- 
together old age — thou retainest from neigh- 
bor Youth a strong hand, or an abundant 
chevelure, a keen eye, or a quick wit. When 
Swift's wanderer first heard of the Struld- 
brugs, he cried in transport "What a happy 
society theirs must be ! Relieved from the 
fear of death, at leisure to stow their minds 
with the wisdom of the ancients, and ever 
gathering experience — sure there can be no 
better company!" But upon introduction, he 
found them bitter and querulous, gloomy yet 
trifling; their only pleasure the dissemination 
of scandal, and the ailments which afflicted 
them at sixty continuing always the same, 
without increase or diminution. Yet this 
Dantean circle resulted only from durability 
of life, segregation, and numbers. There were, 
if I remember rightly, about fifteen hundred 
in the colony. No Old Folks' Home has ever 
been so large; but if such an one were found, 
it would, I imagine, bear a strong resem- 



34 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

blance to Swift's community of Struldbrugs. 

February 2. As usual, the sun shone to- 
day. Candlemas is almost always bright 
with us. The old sayings "Clear and bright, 
winter will have another flight". "Candle- 
mas Day, half your corn and half your hay", 
refer not only to a climate very different 
from ours, but also to the old style so long 
prevalent in England, which set everything 
back eight or ten days. A pretty strife in 
town between trolley and grocery men, pitch- 
ing snow back and forth from tracks to gut- 
ter. 

The Sybarite whom it tired to see other 
people work, has been often held up to ridi- 
cule; but he was only born before his time. 
Had he lived nowadays he might well have 
belonged to one of those associations some 
of whose members were not long since heard 
discussing and denouncing the conduct of a 
farmer who worked sixteen hours a day. In 
some way — how, was not exactly made clear 
— they conceived that the interests of their 
order were jeopardized because a man in his 
own business worked longer hours than they 
did in theirs. Somewhat analogous to this is 
the indignation expressed by times at men- 
tion of the harvest moon, for that the peas- 
antry of Europe used to get in their crops by 
its light, supplementing the day; which indig- 
nation appears almost side by side with jub- 
ilant statements that the Western harvests 
are so heavy that the farmers are obliged to 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 3^ 

run their reapers by night. Again, one shall 
see calls for an eight hour day in one news- 
paper column, and in the next glad refer- 
ences to the fact that the mills at such and 
such a place are running overtime. 

February j. Very cold. Spent all morn- 
ing carrying wood and keeping up fires. Ani- 
mals seem to have no idea of exercising to 
keep warm. They just turn their backs to 
the wind and crouch; but perhaps if one had 
only a limited amount of fuel it would be bet- 
ter just to keep a spark alive till the snap was 
over than to burn it all out in a few hours. 

The first legislation against cruelty to ani- 
mals is said to have been an enactment 
passed in the days of Queen Elizabeth pro- 
hibiting "plowing at the horse's tail" as then 
practised in Ireland. 

This custom consisted in lashing the plow- 
beam to the horse's tail with a bit of rope, 
and then, while one man held the plow, an- 
other walked backward before the animal, 
guiding it with blows of a stick. It seems as 
though this plan must have cocked the plow 
so high into the air that the point would take 
no hold on the soil. It seems also as if only 
the most spiritless of equines would have sub- 
mitted to the treatment, but that it was fre- 
quently done the act against it proves. The 
cruelty of the practise needs no demonstra- 
tion; it could not have been profitable, but 
was perhaps preferable to starvation. 
Whether the English legislators were moved 



36 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

solely by pity of the miserable beast, or 
whether they desired to make a market for 
English plows and harness does not appear; 
probably their motives were mixed, as some- 
times happens, even at the present day, when 
those who bear to look on fights, cannot bear 
to look on films. 

Fahruary /f. Shakespeare, in ''Henry the 
V." speaks of the meadows, neglected 
through war, being grown up to docks and 
kecksies. In "Evenings at Home", (circa 
1800) George says, referring to the stems 
of the water hemlock, "the boys blow 
through them, and call them kexes". This 
same water hemlock is said to be poisonous 
to foals, and is allied to our wild carrot, 
through eating of which Mr. W. died. Tame 
carrots occasionally revert to wild, or else 
the seed is mixed. 

Poisonous plants and herbage seem to 
have been more abundant in days of yore 
than now, as, indeed, do poisonous grains 
and fruits. But it may be that everything 
which was, or looked, edible was so scarce 
that neither man nor beast could pick and 
choose. It may also be that dyspepsia was 
so rare that a brisk attack of it was called a 
case of poisoning. Xenophon's troops, poi- 
soned by wild honey, will at once come to 
mind, also the divinity students who ate wild 
gourds with Elisha. Sheep have at times 
been more or less poisoned by lambkill, kal- 
mia, or wild laurel. Cows can eat poison 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 37 

ivy with impunity, though as that Is a blood 
poison, the fact is the less remarkable. Both 
cattle and sheep are said to have been pois- 
oned by eating the young sprouts of the wild 
cherry, which, as does the peach, contains a 
dash of prussic acid in its leaves. Poke- 
weed berries, and the flowers of the trumpet 
creeper, used to be classed among noxious 
attractions of this kind, at least I remember 
divers woes being visited on children who 
assayed to blow the said trumpets. Lastly, 
that very uninviting herb, stramomium, or 
jimson weed, is placed, with much reason, 
among the forbidden fruits. 

February 5. Yesterday distinctly saw sun 
spot through smoked glass. Some attribute 
the extreme cold of the winter to this. 

A glass slipper, in the well known fairy 
tale, probably meant one spangled with glass 
beads; just as a glass coach, somewhat later 
in the day, signified a carriage fitted with 
glass windows. It needs no demonstration 
that a slipper of solid glass would be utter- 
ly unsuited for dancing, even though it might 
more rigidly exclude the pretender and the 
intruder. Glass, like most of the flowers we 
cultivate, came at first in very small morsels, 
though in many cases, unsurpassedly rich in 
color — teste the mediaeval church windows. 
But as the chrysanthemum has grown from a 
button to a hat, so has plate glass enlarged 
upon us; and now every little shopkeeper can 
have panes to his show window of a size no 



3S A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

monarch on earth could have obtained two 
hundred years ago. So far has this gone 
that the pane's humble old friends — putty 
and lead — seem in a fair way to be entirely 
discarded; and some of the modern windows 
are hooked together with little metal hinges 
or buckles as though intended to open at any 
point that will please the taste of customers, 
or the art of the window dresser. 

February 6. Gullying of slopes varies 
greatly with the soil. As a rule, it is worst 
on the best lands. On a heavy, strong loam 
the washout is crooked, at first thrown right 
and left by the stones which It later under- 
mines, bringing down the overlying soil. On 
our red shale the matter Is different. While 
the soil gullies easily, the washout is straight 
and always hard at the bottom, where it goes 
down to the rock. But never have I seen 
more melancholy examples of washing than 
in the Apennines near Pistoia. Great hills 
of yellow clay, without tree, bush or grass, 
ripped down the sides in all directions by 
huge, ragged gullies with deltas of silt 
spreading out from their bottoms, went to 
form one of the most depressing landscapes 
I have ever looked upon. 

February J . Started an owl from a tree 
near the barn-yard last night. He probably 
had an eye to the pigeons. Some years since 
I heard a curious snapping noise In the barn 
at night, which I attributed to rats. Next 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 39 

morning on opening the door of the pigeon's 
box an owl bustled out, leaving behind him 
the remains of two squabs. This was most 
likely a screech owl, as they are numerous 
hereabout, while I have never certainly noted 
the large barn owl. 

February 8. What can be seen of the 
winter wheat looks poorly. A heavy drift 
overlies part of the field, but beyond this a 
thin sheet of ice covers most of it. And ice 
is as bad for grain as snow is good. 

How many of Dickens' grimy, gloomy, 
squalid interiors would be unbearable but for 
one irradiating object — a pot of liquor. The 
draught administered by Newman Noggs to 
Smike, just arrived in London from York- 
shire, the purl shared by Swiveller and the 
Marchioness at their memorable game of 
cards in the damp kitchen, the punch which 
Quilp's family and the watermen were im- 
bibing at the time of his unexpected return — 
is not the cordial julep, flaming and dancing 
in its pewter bounds, the life of many more 
that might be enumerated? 

February g. Much time has been spent 
this winter in shoveling paths and breaking 
out roads. What useless and unprofitable 
work it is. After hours of it, one is no bet- 
ter off than before the storm. The Romans 
were the best road builders, the Arabs the 
poorest. These last had no snow, frost, mud 
or swamps and but few rivers. 



40 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK i 

The condition of a slave or serf is the 
cause of contumelious treatment lingering 
after the conditions to which it gave rise 
have passed away — not the color of the skin. 
The Ethiopians were slaves here, the abo- 
rigines were not generally so. Consequently, 
they are held in very different esteem. Most 
folks are rather proud of being descended 
from an Indian. Negroes are not pariahs in 
Europe, because there the dark face never in- 
dicated a bondman — nay, the swarthy 
Moors ruled over the fairer Spaniards for 
centuries. By the way, did that fine old ex- 
pression "blackamore" designate a person 
black as a Moor, or blacker than a Moor? 
In England, that early bird, the Saxon, be- 
came a serf under Norman rule; and that is 
why the low class Englishman was so cava- 
lierly treated by the high class Englishman 
until a very recent period. One proof of the 
way human beings were regarded as stocks 
and stones in that country (as a Friend of 
Humanity might exclaim) is that the traveller 
there hardly ever sees a hitching post; a boy 
is supposed to spring up at a whistle (and he 
mostly does) to hold your horse for tup- 
pence. 

February lo. When splitting a heavy 
chunk, if you cannot hit hard enough to 
cleave it, turn the axe, so as to strike its poll 
on the chopping block, with the billet stick- 
ing on the blade. Gravitation thus conies to 
your aid, and the weight of the chunk is its 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 41 

own undoing. 

Many modern tools were fashioned or de- 
vised from the unaccustomed use of an old 
one. E. G., the Acme harrow-tooth from 
the track left by a plow run on its share 
edge ; the tedder from the upward and back- 
ward stroke of a pitchfork. It is said that 
the old-time sickle had teeth like a saw, and 
from no other instrument could the action 
of the machine mower blade even seem to be 
derived. The greatest step in the evolution 
of the plow was probably taken by him who 
first observed that a triangular stock would 
turn the soil upward and sideways better than 
a round rooter. Next, but at a great inter- 
val, came the iron point or share used by 
Samson's contemporaries. Then the coulter 
known to Chaucer and the Cid; but the 
wooden mold board, so often alluded to by 
Scott's peasantry as needing to be scraped 
clear of mold with the plough-paidle, hung 
on almost to our own time. An illustration 
to an edition of Thomson's "Seasons", pub- 
lished in the late 1700's, represents the farm- 
er going forth to turn his first spring furrow, 
paidle in hand. And a most discouraging 
task it must have been, for only a sandv sod 
will slip cleanly from wood. 

February 11. How many fatal spots one 
comes to know in a neighborhood after long 
residence. Just adjoining the north end of 
this farm is a gully where a murder was com- 
mitted some fifty years ago; and in the river 



42 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

nearby a girl was drowned thirty-five years 
back. About the same time a drunkard was 
drowned in a ditch of the Island Farm east- 
ward. I know a house in town, which while 
building fell on two men and killed them, 
and a yard wherein a woman was burnt to 
death. 

February 12. S. Perhaps one of the 
hardest blows ever dealt the hapless abo- 
rigines of this continent was calling them In- 
dians so that naming them referred them, as 
it were, to another land. 

That more than half our States have re- 
tained the aboriginal names was a thing 
hardly to be expected, considering that but 
two of the old thirteen did so, and how 
strongly the colonists' taste ran to old asso- 
ciations. Maryland, Virginia, Georgia, the 
Carolinas, were named for monarchs, Dela- 
ware for a noble, Vermont, Pennsylvania, 
Florida were fanciful. New York goes back 
to old Eboracum, New Jersey to Caesar's 
Isle in the Channel. Maine and Rhode Isl- 
and were dubbed for territory that never be- 
longed to Great Britain. New Hampshire 
for an English county, California for a Span- 
ish romance. Montana, Colorado, and Ne- 
vada would seem to have gone on their looks. 
That one state should have refused to part 
with the name of our greatest man was per- 
haps inevitable. It is not surprising that 
Scandinavians should have termed southern 
New England Vinland; but (to go out of our 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 43 

Union for a moment) a reason is far to 
seek for Spaniards calling that forbidding 
peninsula north of the St. Lawrence Labra- 
dor (farming land). One can but suppose 
they did it because, bearing no forests, it 
looked already cleared for the husbandman. 

February /j. Hay coming up from the 
salt meadows on sleds. It is difficult to make 
a good load on a sled, as on a boat, because 
of the narrowness and instability of the 
foundation. 

Hay seems to have been little known in 
the Middle Ages. Stock was wintered most- 
ly on straw and leaves. Tusser, who wrote 
in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, gives much 
advice to the farmer as to the cutting and 
storing of green branches, which might serve 
as fodder, when pasture failed. He is par- 
ticular as to the desirability of saving the 
beech cuttings for the milch cows ; whereas 
for sheep anything would do. A miserable 
dependence it would appear to us now, but 
then it seems to have been looked on, if not 
as a matter of course, at least as a thing 
practiced by the more forehanded and capa- 
ble. There must have been some natural 
meadows in England, even then, but perhaps 
all their produce was saved for the horses of 
kings. As far as I can recollect, there is no 
mention of hay in Shakespeare, if we except 
Bottom's remark ''Good hay, sweet hay, 
hath no fellow", and even that suggests its 
rarity. By Milton's time, a hundred years 



44 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

later, "The mower whets his scythe" "And 
the tanned haycock In the mead" were faml- 
Har country objects. 

February i^. Last season, when I got 
some potatoes from a cellar under an unin- 
habited house, It was like plucking them out 
of the very jaws of winter. The planks and 
beams above the windows, and the upper 
part of the walls, shone and sparkled with 
frost, while only the warm breath slowly ris- 
ing from the heart of earth kept the vegeta- 
bles alive. 

February 75. Thoreau has spoken of the 
Indigo shadows on snow. One summer day, 
when looking toward the distant horizon, un- 
der the branches of thick trees, I saw what 
I took for black storm clouds. Next moment 
I saw that some clothing upon a line filled the 
space, and Instantly what had looked black 
looked white. 

February 16. Once, burning some brush 
with an English boy, we differed as to the 
best method of placing the sticks. He wanted 
to set them up In pyramidal form, while I 
thought they did best laid horizontally. Af- 
ter some days' dissension, I said to him one 
morning "You make a fire over there, I'll 
build one here; It will save carrying the sticks 
so far". This we accordingly did, but I no- 
ticed that several times during the forenoon 
he came to my fire for brands to keep his up, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 45 

and after that he was more of my opinion. 

When showing a laborer that he "kens 
na his work by half", is it best to do so as 
soon as the error is made, or the fault com- 
mitted, or to let it go until the next time he 
is about to do the same thing? Of course, 
one has then the advantage of speaking in 
coolness, and being able to point out the mis- 
takes to be avoided as they approach. On 
the other hand, there arc those who cannot 
reprove at all, unless they do it under irrita- 
tion, and to postpone it until emotion has 
passed away makes them feel, with Archdea- 
con Grantley, that much good hot anger has 
been wasted. Doubtless the laborer would 
prefer that nothing should ever be said at all 
about his faults, but the owner can hardly be 
expected to submit to the spoiling of his 
goods until it gradually dawns upon the hire- 
ling that something is wrong, and (still more 
slowly) what is the best way to mend it. 
Burns, it is recorded, was wont to say when 
he heard his brother, Gilbert, scolding the 
farmhands, "Oh, man, ye are no for young 
folk", but Burns' end was not such as to en- 
courage any other farmer in the like good 
nature. 

February //. Very icy roads. Went to 
town with smooth shod horse, and crawled 
about the lower streets, both he and I in 
great terror. Being unable to get a place at 
the blacksmith's, I finally procured some bur- 
lap at a store, and tied his feet up in It like 



46 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

puddings. This, to some extent, gave him 
stability, but as the stuff cut through every 
five minutes, I had frequently to stop and ad- 
just it, endeavoring to get as much of a pad 
as possible under the sole. Thus, with much 
delay and many scrambles, we got home 
without an actual fall. 

February i8. Those numerous ladies 
who nowadays denounce skirts should pause 
and reflect how many female statues have 
been preserved by their flowing draperies, 
and of how many male nought has come 
down to us but feet and ankles. 

The first thing which can be called a stat- 
ue, mentioned in all history, was probably 
Lot's wife. Then there were those which 
woke to life, e. g., Pygmalion's bride and 
Hermione, and those whose mutilation was 
resented as if they had been alive — the 
Athenian Hermae. It has often been stated 
that sculpture, to be satisfactory, must either 
follow the lines of the human figure, or the 
flow of drapery. Plate-armor, it is true, 
which does neither of these things, makes a 
very fair appearance in counterfeit present- 
ments, probably for the reason that it recog- 
nizes the joints. Perhaps a remark might 
not here be misplaced concerning the present 
helpless state of the Worth monument. As 
all men know, this stands at Broadway and 
Twentieth Street, bearing a small equestrian 
figure of the hero on the south and on the 
north an arm mailed and bowed, holding a 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 47 

bronze sabre. But the blade is gone these 
many years. What became of it? 

I recollect a seated statue of the donor 
of a certain building, which was at first 
placed facing it, only a few feet away. Sub- 
sequently, the proprieties seemed to dictate 
to someone in authority that the statue's 
back should be turned to his gift, and his 
face to the recipient town. Which was ac- 
cordingly done. 

February ig. S. In a revival either of 
learning, manners or religion, the bringing 
of fresh fuel to the fire is frequently mistak- 
en for an enlargement of the hearth. 

Gray's Elegy is probably the first great 
poem wherein the peasant is brought into 
the foreground. He had figured largely as 
a setting for the noble, as his henchman, ser- 
vitor, or admirer. In fact, for a long time 
the villager was as essential to a tale of high 
life as a piece of water to a landscape; that 
he might reflect what was above him. But 
Gray makes him the principal figure, and 
treats his occupations, diversions and inter- 
ests from the outside, it is true, but with a se- 
dulous attention unexampled until then. The 
poet himself, and the kindred spirit who 
might inquire his fate, are treated as the ac- 
cessories; literally, they are the walking gen- 
tlemen of the piece. This was one of Miss 
Austen's weakest points — that she could only 
draw the lower class as domestic servants, 
and but indifferently at that. There has been 



48 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

a mighty change In this matter since Gray's 
time; the gentleman has been attrited, the 
artisan elaborated. But he was the pioneer 
in the movement, the discoverer of the lowly 
and grimy coal, which was ultimately to turn 
out so many more pot-boUers than the fair 
and stately trees of the forest could ever 
have furnished with sufficient fuel. 

February 20. The phenomenon known as 
"freezing dry" has been many times ob- 
served this cold weather. The Ice on the 
front porch, hard and black on Tuesday, be- 
gins to look whitish underneath, Wednesday, 
as If pried away from the planks a little. 
Thursday, the edges begin to break Into bays 
and coves. Friday, only a few ribs and ridges 
remain. Saturday, they are all gone, like a 
scrawl wiped off a slate. And meanwhile no 
thaw. 

February 21. Probably the venal voter Is 
more In evidence now than at one time In the 
Republic's history — a vulgar antithesis to the 
conscientious Mugwump. A neighbor has 
suggested a remedy, which If not Immediate- 
ly practical seems at any rate worthy of con- 
sideration. This consists In the buying up of 
such voters, once for all, by the Federal or 
State Government, for a lump sum — say, 
$50.00 per head. Every person so selling, 
would be. Ipso facto, disfranchised for life 
and officially registered as such. Addlckses 
would thus be deprived of their following, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 49 

and bribery confined to legislative halls. 
Probably any one who would sell his vote at 
all would sell it to the Government, for a 
sum to equal which would require a dozen 
years chaffering. The advantages of this 
plan are obvious and great, and Its cost 
would be soon repaid. 

February 22. Children sliding down the 
streets have never been so numerous or im- 
pudent as this year. The long continued 
frost has made almost every part of the town 
available for the sport. On Hassert Street, 
a few days ago, I noticed how the ice had 
piled up ; not only the sky-fall, but the slops 
thrown from the houses had congealed, and 
burled gutter and sidewalk out of sight. If 
these conditions prevailed the year round, 
many a house would be entombed in its own 
filth. 

The innate corruption and depravity of 
human nature were perhaps never more 
clearly brought out than in the historic Black 
Hole of Calcutta. That atrocity stands un- 
rivalled as an Instance of the utmost suffer- 
ing humanity can endure, passed through by 
a large number, yet leaving a few survivors 
to tell the tale. Many more have been slain 
or executed at one time, death being antici- 
pated; but probably only safe keeping of the 
prisoners was Intended, and only fear of 
breaking a despot's sleep prevented their 
earlier release. Yet this torture, "unequaled 
In history or fiction, whose record cannot be 



50 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

read unmoved after the lapse of a hundred 
and fifty years", was produced merely by 
crowding men together in an ill ventilated 
room. No fires, racks, or scourges were 
needed; all that was done or required to be 
done was to take from each the amount of 
air and space to which he was accustomed, 
crush him into close proximity with his fel- 
lows, and the thing was accomplished. 

February 2j. Finished splitting the winter's 
rails — about sixty. Have never been able 
to determine whether they split best from top 
or butt. Sometimes one succeeds, sometimes 
the other. In splitting posts the usual plan 
is for the men to face each other, one slowly 
advancing while the other backs away, and 
the blow of each into the cleft loosening his 
partner's axe. Some years ago, as two 
brothers were thus engaged, one of them got 
a little too close, and the descending blade 
just grazed his forehead, knocking him down 
and leaving an ugly gash. Another inch 
would have split his skull. 

February 2^. Pigeons are very persistent 
bathers. Whenever the horse-trough is left 
uncovered, a cheesy white scum shows they 
have been there; and one bitter cold day 
when the plumbers turned a stream from the 
pipe they were repairing into an icy hollow 
the pigeons flew down and began plunging 
into the freezing pool. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 51 

February 2^. I do not know that 
the process of milking has ever been 
described. The forefinger first clasps 
the upper part of the teat, and then 
the middle, ring, and little fingers in 
rapid succession, so as to drive the milk be- 
fore them through the orifice. The knack is 
rather dif^cult to acquire, and at first very 
wearying to the hands; though this soon 
passes. 

Some form of green feed for milch cows 
In winter was long a desideratum, but the 
need Is now fairly well supplied by ensilage, 
which, as every one knows, is some kind of 
fodder, generally green corn, cut up and 
packed under pressure, which preserves It in 
a certain state of fermentation, very like 
sauer-kraut. The process was first applied 
to the tops of beets, which It seemed pity to 
waste, and which kept in pits fairly well for a 
few weeks. I cannot say that my experience 
with silage has been favorable, but then I 
am not a progressive. Roots do fairly well 
for a few cows, and do not require a large 
force at once, or a special building for their 
reception. Sugar beets or mangels are best; 
turnips will do, but do not keep so well, and 
give the milk an unpleasant taste. Root cut- 
ters are on the market, but the one we used 
lost a tooth now and then, which falling 
among the beets, was like to choke the cows. 
So for years we have sliced them up prlme- 
vally with a knife or sharp spade. In Eng- 
land — see Hardy's "Tess" — they smash 



52 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

them up, turnips at least, with a heavy mal- 
let, placing them one by one in a small hollow 
dug out of the top of a wooden block. Car- 
rots are best of all, but too expensive, and 
hard to keep. 

February 26. S. A drift has been over 
one panel of the fence near the woods for 
just a month, so little has it thawed during 
the last thirty days. 

February 2J. In summer, when windows 
are open, I can tell how the chores go on at 
the barn by the sound of the different doors 
opening and shutting. But in winter "be- 
yond these voices there is peace". The cries 
of inanimate objects, save under great stress, 
as in the frost-blow mentioned above, are 
stilled. Ice furnishes an admirable lubricant 
for hinges, when it will let them turn 
at all, and a still more admirable wedge to 
prevent banging. The tool that falls in snow, 
the foot that treads in snow, are alike muf- 
fled. The stock do not need so much water, 
and the pump, in consequence, has little to 
do. The wagon wheels, swelled and cush- 
ioned by damp, cease to give forth their dis- 
tinctive creakings, and the sled is noiseless. 
The animals also are mostly mute. The pig- 
eon's claws do not clatter on the roof, nor 
are their cooings heard from the ridge. The 
fowls no longer chuckle, or cackle, or cluck. 
Only the valiant cock will crow until starva- 
tion and high thinking, is reached. Cats and 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 53 

dogs cease to express their pleasure or pain, 
lowing and neighing and squalling are well 
nigh forgotten. The animals stand for an 
hour together in one place instead of the con- 
stant stamping and shifting induced by the 
flies. Only once a month or so will an aval- 
anche of corn, undermined at one end, pour 
down in the crib, or melting snow, with a 
very similar sound, go sliding off a steep 

roof. 

« 

1 

February 28. On averaging the sunrise 
temperature of the month, which I have kept 
for many years, I find this to be the coldest 
February since 1875; just thirty years. This 
year averaged (taking only early morning 
temperatures) thirteen degrees. 

Should have trimmed grape vines today; 
have done it for many years on Feb. 28. 

Of course the method of taking tempera- 
tures mentioned above is open to objection. 
If every afternoon and evening were mild, 
and only the morning sharp (a thing not like- 
ly, but possible) the month, as a whole, 
might show a high average. 

The imperfection of standards is striking- 
ly illustrated by the frequent practice of put- 
ting a human figure beside the thing depicted, 
for comparison. While this is the most feas- 
ible way of getting at the size of many ob- 
jects,' — trees for example — it is liable to 
abuse on the advertising page. There, if you 
want the goods offered, or the advantages at- 
tained, as a horse or a string of fish, to ap- 



54 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

pear large, put a small man beside — if it is 
desirable they should appear small, as the 
folding boat from which the fish are taken, 
put a large man beside. The counterfeit pre- 
sentment of a bright and pretty girl has sold 
many a sewing machine; and that of a tall 
handsome man helped off much whiskey and 
cigars. Not that grief, misfortune, wounds, 
and penury are absent from the advertising 
sheet; but they are always traceable to one of 
two causes — either a refusal to purchase any 
goods whatever, or a mistaken purchase of 
the other fellow's goods. 

March i. The perfection of art is to con- 
ceal art, the perfection of riding to be car- 
ried without much thinking about it; the per- 
fection of digestion is not to know that you 
have one, and so the perfection of life may 
be not to feel, through the senses, that wc 
live. 

March 2. Let evil end with you. Do not 
pass on the scandal, the doubt, the injustice, 
the abuse you have received. Moral gar- 
bage, thus consumed, shall lighten your 
neighborhood, instead of cumbering and de- 
filing it. 

March j. Fox-fire has been unusually 
prevalent this year. Generally it appears on 
a white oak stump, which has decayed from 
within, so that the whole interior glows like 
a crucible. At times it seems to vibrate and 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 55 

change like the Northern Lights on a small 
scale, but it is difficult to be sure of this. 

March 4. The following conversation 
was heard between two young people in a 
trolley car passing Ross Hall, an old time 
building up the river, now the Golf House. 
He — "That was the home of Janice Mere- 
dith". She— "Who was she?" He— "Oh, a 
Revolutionary character." She — "She must 
be a very old lady by now." He — "Oh, she 
was a creation of the brain of Paul Ford, the 
millionaire was killed by his brother last 
Spring." She— "Is that so?" He— "So, you 
see, she never lived at all." She — "Oh, the 
poor thing!" 

In the above dialogue, it is doubtful which 
stood first with the narrator; Ford's talent, 
his fate, or his wealth. 

How few authors have lived by their 
works until they were dead ! Homer proba- 
bly did it, and perhaps Kipling; and Pope, 
and Dumas. But Dante was a hanger-on, 
and so, was Horace, and so was La Fontaine. 
Petrarch was a titular canon. Burns an excise 
man, ditto Wordsworth. Thomson under 
secretary to the Leeward Islands, wherein he 
never set foot. Hook treasurer at the Mau- 
ritius. Gibbon had, for a short time, a place 
under government, and Congreve had too, 
for a long time. Spenser was secretary to 
the deputy lieutenant of Ireland. Nay, is it 
not said that a certain prominent American 
man of letters was given a counsulship at 



S6 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

Venice because he wrote a campaign life of 
the successful candidate? Voltaire died rich, 
stock-jobbing was his line, and he seems to 
have kept what he got. Even the few writ- 
ers whose pens have really been golden ones, 
like Scott and Tupper, (their only slmlllar- 
ity) seem generally to have been beguiled in- 
to taking stock In the publishing company 
which sent forth their works, with results the 
most disastrous. Of no other profession can 
It be said that two members of it as distin- 
guished as Spenser and Otway died, the one 
for lack of bread, the other from Its super- 
abundance. 

March 5. S. The blackbirds are begin- 
ning to drift to and fro. In moving they go 
westward, presumably to Bear Swamp some 
twenty miles away. In evening eastward 
again to spend the night on the salt marshes. 
They fly In large flocks of two or three hun- 
dred each, for the most part very compactly, 
but there are always a few stragglers, striv- 
ing to keep up and chirping dismally. They 
rush over with a loud "hoosh" thick 'as rip- 
ples on a pond. 

March 6. Our County-seat is what has 
been called a "wooden town". The great 
majority of the houses are frame, perhaps 
one In ten brick; and only three stone ones. 
On the road to Bound Brook there are four 
or five more, built from the best and hardest 
of the native shale. One of these, said to 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 57 

have been occupied by Lafayette in days of 
yore, is stone to the eaves, roof and gables 
of wood, the thickness of the wall covered 
over with plank, forming a bulk seat across 
the end chambers, light half length hewn raf- 
ters mortised into girts, and a little three slat 
hole in the upper corner of each solid shut- 
ter. 

March 7. Holing posts. Partly with au- 
ger, partly with post axe. This last is a little 
tool with a blade about two inches wide. 
With this one pecks away at top and bottom 
of the place marked on the flattened side of 
the post until two little slits are cut through, 
when the piece between is knocked out. Per- 
haps no implement so well illustrates the sar- 
castic inquiry made by the old chopper of the 
novice, "Kin ye hit two times in three 
places"? 

The auger is less likely to split the posts 
than the axe above described, and leaves a 
neater hole, but it is harder work, and cannot 
be done at all when the log is frozen, as the 
ice soon chokes the screw. 

March 8. Wit consists in the discovery 
of dissimilarities in things apparently alike; 
humor, in the perception of likenesses in mat- 
ters seemingly different. The first is cold and 
sharp; the second warm and mild. The one 
seeks antitheses; the other analogies. Wit 
cuts, humor joins. Wit is a gunbarrel, hu- 
mor a hose-pipe. Wit makes admiring ene- 
mies, humor, contemptuous friends. A wit 



58 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

never thinks himself a fool; a humorist of- 
ten doubts his wisdom. Mephistopheles had 
plenty of wit; it belongs to the "freundlich 
Element", but a water drinking saint may be 
a rare humorist. Wit is natural to a woman 
as a hat-pin, but few females wield the club 
of humor. Dignity is the garb of wit, as 
brevity its soul; humor goes barefoot and 
ungirt, as Gamelyn, dealing much in circum- 
locutions. Wit may rebuke a king; humor 
jests with a clown. Wit is of the town and 
the covert; humor of the field and the ale- 
house. Wit Is a spur, humor a peck of oats. 
And yet, with all these differences, so much 
do they at times Include and resemble each 
other, that both may be found packed togeth- 
er In the title of one small State — Connecti- 
cut. 

March g. I remember a cedar and maple 
growing as close together as if they sprang 
from the same root. Some thirty-five or six 
years ago they were about twenty feet in 
height and the maple was probably about the 
same number of years old; the cedar twice as 
much. The maple Is now twice that height, 
and Its desperate efforts to straighten killed 
the cedar (round which It takes a complete 
turn) and flattened itself grotesquely. 

March lo. First spring-like day. In even- 
ing smelt a muskrat. This and the skunk 
cabbage are the first scents of spring and it 
is curious they should both be unpleasant 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 59 

ones. Have never yet seen a musk-rat, long 
as I have lived here, and often as I have 
smelt him, the 'possum is much more famil- 
iar, being now and then found in outlying 
town houses. This last animal has been de- 
scibed as a mix up of bear, hog, and monkey. 
This has been a profitless winter in the way 
of work; little done beyond cutting wood, 
breaking paths and keeping alive. 

March 11. Cutting at a stump today, I 
reached a httle too far, and, striking on top 
of the stump, split the axe helve from end to 
end. I kept at work, however, and at last 
cut through the root with the crippled tool, 
swinging it by the fibres. It reminded me of 
Umslopogaas' mace, described by Rider 
Haggard, wherewith he was able to do great 
execution because the handle was flexible. 

The Novel, some few sports and freaks 
excepted. Is an annual plant. Fine biennials 
are known, and even perennials, though these 
last, when closely examined, will generally be 
found to have thrown out a kind of sucker or 
layer, which maintains an independent exis- 
tence after the parent stock has perished. 
But as a rule, they are growths of one sea- 
son. 

The old-fashioned romance, indeed, ran 
its course with the season's vegetation, 
springing up in April or May, blooming in 
summer, and ending in September; while per- 
haps the majority of modern novels do bet- 
ter under glass from Fall to Spring; still, 



6o A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

their average time of thrift remains much 
the same in length, viz. from six to nine 
months. The briefest bloomer of celebrity 
is perhaps Ivanhoe, the time occupied in the 
actions of that novel being little more than 
three weeks. The Antiquary covers about a 
month, July 15th to August loth. Craw- 
ford's "Cigarette Maker's Romance", the 
cress and mustard literature, covers only 
four and twenty hours. "The Heart of Mid 
Lothian" and "Old Mortality" are so to 
speak, resurrection plants — burgeoning 
some three months, then closing for a long 
term of years, and anon blooming out once 
more for a week or two. "Joseph Vance" 
and its like are not plants, but trees. 

March 12. S. Yesterday began pulling 
down lean-to of the barn at Clifton. The 
door of this building is made of planks 
which, from their markings, evidently once 
formed the case of a picture sent from 
France to a Philadelphia dealer on the S. S. 
Normania. Pried off the roof as a whole; 
dizzy work. 

Probably most persons on a height are 
more or less ill at ease. A stationary height 
that is; for by all accounts the prentice sailor 
soon recovered from his qualms in this re- 
spect, a result only to be accounted for by 
the ship's independent life and motion. The 
weakness may perhaps be overcome by early 
and determined effort; it is said that Goethe 
cured himself of it, when a youth, by sitting 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 6i 

aloft in Strassburg spire, where the chimes 
seemed to make the structure vibrate and 
swing, but success In this line must ever re- 
main doubtful. The actual or apparent re- 
volts set up by various parts of the human 
frame divine — the insurgency of those or- 
gans whose existence wc would ever choose 
to forget: The sudden anxiety of brain and 
eye for a merry waltz, the determined re- 
solve of feet to become hands, almost burst- 
ing their shoes In the effort to gripe a suppo- 
sitious branch — all these cannot but con- 
found the constitution's well ordered feder- 
ahty, and probably to feel secure on the out- 
side of a dome one must have either wings 
like birds or roots like hair. Memory still 
pictures that unhappy youth once seen walk- 
ing round the circle of St. Paul's, holding 
his hat before his face, and groaning, "Oh, 
why did I come up here?" 

Little has been done in literature with 
roofs; those places whereon, as good Jeremy 
Taylor salth, "the footing Is slight, the pros- 
pect vertiginous, and the devil busy, and de- 
sirous to thrust us headlong". Not to dwell 
further on the instance thus adverted to, nor 
yet on David's promenade, perhaps the most 
notable success In this sort is Hugo's "Notre 
Dame". The illusion of being high In the 
air (but by no means the nearer heaven on 
that account ) is wondrously caught and kept 
in this story. While perhaps less than half 
the action takes place aloft, nearly all of it 
seems to do so; wc rebound like balls to the 



62 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

level which has come to seem our natural 
habitat. The death of Jehan over the door- 
way, that of Claud by falling from the tow- 
er, seem like those of sailors who end their 
duty or their mutiny by the chances of the 
ship whereon their lives have been spent; 
while Esmeralda's mother, the anchoress, is 
a barnacle on its side. That once popular 
author, George Macdonald, has a very good 
description of two children astray on a 
church roof in "Wilfred Cumbermede". 
The chapter was widely copied as a scene of 
adventure, without respect to the rest of the 
tale, but though elaborate and ingenious, it 
lacked Hugo's well mastered giddiness. 

March /j. With warm and drying days 
appear those little whirlwinds known in Eng- 
land, according to Haggard, as ^'Roger's 
blasts" or "Fairies going to court". From 
two to six feet in diameter, they rush across 
the fields, whirling up dust and dead grass, 
and sometimes breaking into quite a roar 
when they strike a mass of leaves. The per- 
sistence of these baby tornadoes is wonder- 
ful. One that I well remember, not more 
than a yard across, passed over a field, and 
entered the woods, where I looked to see it 
soon broken up and stilled, but, with marvel- 
ous vitality, it passed among and through the 
tree trunks and after enduring for a hundred 
yards or more, went down a hillside and out 
upon the pond, still whirling from left to 
right like a watch. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 63 

March 14. Was It Person who went 
from Dante to beer shop crying "All is bar- 
ren"? 

March 75. A farmer in this country is 
more or less an object of contempt to town's 
people. It was not always so, if one may 
trust the books. In "Doctor Thorne" Trol- 
lope represents the young men from Barches- 
ter pretending to be laborers on the estate in 
order to get to the squire's picnic. But now 
a mill-hand considers himself better than a 
farmer, ipso factory. Even when people 
want to be friendly with a tiller of the soil, 
it may be observed that they generally begin 
by asking if he finds farming pays; a ques- 
tion they would never dream of putting to a 
man of any other occupation. 

This sinking of the farmer in general es- 
teem is the more remarkable in view of the 
rise of sundry once despised occupations, e. 
g., nurse and scavenger. But apparently the 
agriculturist has inherited the contempt once 
bestowed on the rising serf and the falling 
squire. 

The nurses of history and of ancient fic- 
tion, were mostly in charge of infants, not in- 
valids. Such was the case with Sichaeus* 
nurse, appealed to by Dido (hers being 
dead) and Juliet's safe mentor. Helena, In 
"Much Ado about Nothing" rather plays 
the part of doctress than nurse, and we have 
not the sex of the attendant appealed to by 
Charles IX, of France, when in extremis, 



64 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

and remorseful for St. Bartholomew; Mrs. 
Rooke, or Nurse Rooke, in "Persuasion" 
has a sHghtly modern smack; but she is kept 
much in the background, and is chiefly use- 
ful as a gossip. 

No list of this kind were complete without 
mention of the great Sairey Gamp, full of 
humors as her own umbrella of packages. 
Severe criticism has been visited on her tip- 
pling and pilfering, but with it all she 
brought her patient through, and who can do 
more? Perhaps the profession reached its 
nadir about i860, when (as I have seen with 
my own eyes) female convicts from the Pen- 
itentiary were employed as nurses in some of 
the great city hospitals. Since then, the 
change in income, demeanor, and costume of 
the trained nurse has been marvellous, and to 
what is it destined to grow? 

March 16. Scene of a little tragedy. On 
a bit of ground plowed last fall, a sprinkle 
of small feathers showed where a pigeon had 
been devoured. That it had been done by a 
hawk, not a crow, was shown by the few ker- 
nels of corn, which the bird's crop had con- 
tained, lying untouched. 

Found a nest containing three young rab- 
bits in the field. The mother selecting a small 
hollow, deposits her young therein, first lin- 
ing it with fur plucked from her own coat, 
and covering all over with a bunch of the 
same. So long as the grass, or rather weeds, 
stood they were well protected, but mower 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 6s 

and rake had both passed over, carried away 
the crop, and done no further harm beyond 
dragging the fur to one side, thus giving a 
clue to the nursery. I looked in at them, then 
introduced a finger. Until this was done, 
they were still as if dead, but soon as the 
touch of alien flesh was felt they began suc- 
cessively to kick with startling violence. Too 
young to run, (they were about the size of 
large mice, and probably but a day or two 
old,) this must have been to terrify the in- 
tending captor. The coat was thick, and 
rather darker than the adult's; ears, paws, 
and tail yellow and bare; the eyes closed like 
those of young kittens. Covering them up, 
I departed, but when last seen they were try- 
ing to kick off the blanket. Their fate seems 
very uncertain. Such choice morsels for dog, 
crow, or hawk can hardly escape. Seemingly 
they would have been safer in the thicket 
close by, but I suppose maternal instinct may 
be trusted. 

March ly. Saw chicken hawk in flight 
which suggests the motion of an automobile. 
No flapping, no soaring but a series of quick, 
explosive beats of the wings, each sending 
the bird forward in a leap of several yards. 
The flicker gives five strokes, then a jump. 

March i8. Heard a woodpecker, tapping 
the trees in the high woods. How strangely 
he is constructed! If we chopped our teeth 
on a stick loud enough to be heard a hundred 



66 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

feet off, at the end of an hour jaws and gums 
would be so sore we could not bear it. But 
the woodpecker seems to suffer no inconven- 
ience. 

March ig. S. Ice has pretty well gone 
off the pond, and the phenomenon of tides 
in the cove again appears. This is a little 
bay from the pond, about twenty-five feet 
wide by a hundred long, and no where more 
than two feet deep, mostly much less. It is 
fed by a small but constant stream from the 
uplands. For half to three-quarters of a 
minute, the water flows out of this cove, 
swaying the weeds, and carrying the silt 
along, then it stops, and flows inward again; 
a regular tide, proportioned to the water's 
size. I have never been able to determine 
the cause of this movement. The brook 
seems too small to affect it in such a way, the 
pumping station too far off. 

March 20. There are two trees on Rid- 
er's Lane whose union I have watched for 
nearly forty years. As I first remember 
them, a small branch grew horizontally from 
one, just touching the stem of the other, and 
projecting some feet beyond. This, after 
fretting the bark of the tree it did not belong 
to for some years, finally grew into it, joining 
the two; then the part beyond decayed and 
fell off, leaving a short tie; then this also 
rotted and disappeared, and now there mere- 
ly remains a big scar, or callous, on each 
tree, almost meeting. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 67 

March 21. The process above described 
may be better noticed In a beech on our lawn, 
where a short branch, green and sound, firm- 
ly joins two large limbs together. The 
beech's thin bark and vigorous growth favor 
such Inarching, which may be observed still 
oftener In its roots. The impressions pro- 
duced by this tree are very different. Some 
have termed it the lady of the woods, and 
Indeed Its smooth and graceful arms, with 
their thousand spindle-like buds, might seem 
to be reaching forth to what was so long the 
peculiar task of women. On the other hand, 
Spenser calls it "the warrior beech," and Col- 
lins speaks of Sport's "beechen spear". Cer- 
tainly when a straight beech sapling has been 
found (no easy thing) its weight, stiffness 
and strength would well befit a spear st^ff, 
while the thin smooth bark would make 
much shaving down needless. 

March 22. An old man came last night 
wanting to sleep in the barn. He refused all 
pecuniary or alimentary assistance, com- 
pared himself to Him who had not where to 
lay his head, and was so very pressing that I 
finally acquiesced, ushered him into the cow- 
loft, gave him a horse blanket or two, put a 
lock on the hen-house door, close beside, and 
passed a restless night myself, reflecting, 
among other things, that he might die there, 
and necessitate a visit to the coroner. How- 
ever, I saw him go off early while I was 
dressing. There was another ancient hermit 



68 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

of this neighborhood who used to go about 
In a greenish coat girded with rope, and was 
said to have slept all one winter In a burrow 
under a haystack. I can well understand the 
comfort of such primitive lodgings to a per- 
son who cared not for certain mouldlness, 
probable rats or possible fire. 

March 2j. The work of milking Is one of 
those jobs which women have completely 
shuffled off upon the men. For many cen- 
turies this seems to have been their peculiar 
province, at a time, too, when the milkmaid 
had to go after the cows. But never but once 
in my life did I see a woman milking, and I 
Imagine this is generally the case in the 
Northern and Western states. Haggard 
says it Is the same In England. Harris, an 
agricultural writer of thirty years back, 
states that in Canada the women did the 
milking at that time ; but I presume they have 
changed all that. The consequence is, that 
cows are so unused to the sight of women 
that if one by chance comes near them, they 
grow frightened or angry, even to the point 
of attacking her. 

March 24. Working at the demolition of 
Clifton barn today, saw two flocks of wild 
geese go over. Never before have I wit- 
nessed their Northern migration. The first 
gang, of about a dozen, went straight on 
their course, high up In thick gray clouds, 
uttering that "honk", "honk" so easy to rec- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOlC 69 

dgnlze, so hard to imitate. A few minutes 
later came another flock, some eighteen or 
twenty, evidently too large for their leader 
to manage. They disappeared to the north, 
but must have taken a great turn, for five 
minutes after they were right over head, 
tending south. When almost disappearfng 
I saw them swirl and scatter like splashed 
water, then form again and bear up north- 
ward, as if they had got their bearings from 
the river, which at that point must have been 
just below them. While thus boxing the com- 
pass they flew quite low within gunshot. 

March 2^. Many are the idiosyncracies 
of animals. Some horses are afraid of a 
dog, some of a bit of paper, some of a bear, 
some of a car. I have known two mules to 
shy at a big yellow cucumber on a fence, and 
a cow we formerly owned could not endure 
to see any man's hat removed. First frogs. 

The oldest trick recorded of a riding ani- 
mal is that of Balaam's ass, who tried to 
crush its rider's foot against the wall. Bit- 
ing, pawing, and bolting are also described 
in the Scriptures. A balky team figures in 
Esop and Chaucer. That the horses of the 
Saracens used to shy is shown by the tradi- 
tional inquiry "if they thought King Rich- 
ard was in that bush"? This same balking, 
or jibbing, in all its varieties is one of the 
most aggravating of vices. I have in mind 
one horse who, when he thought himself 
overloaded, would rear higher and higher, 



70 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

and finally throw himself down on his side. 
That he never broke a leg in this proceeding 
was wonderful. Others will stand shuffling 
and shivering, and finally give a spring, 
breaking the weakest part of their harness — 
whiffletree, trace, tug, or hame-strap. Some- 
times changing sides, or even changing di- 
rection will put the notion out of the brute's 
head; and he will go off as if nothing had 
happened. However, no trick makes the 
driver feel more helpless than violent back- 
ing; one loses all control over the horse, and 
can do nothing but lay on the whip. 

March 26. S. When visiting some parts 
of the timber, I have not seen for a while, a 
welcome rises from the long neglected 
woods. 

March 27. Tearing down an old shed, 
noticed how the nail, pin or stud, which was 
once meant to hold up a plank, is now upheld 
by it, like an ancient rite or custom whose 
use has departed, but is still practised 
through habit, precedent, or superstition. 
Tennyson has noted this in Mariana. 

"The rusted nails fell from the knots 
That held the peach to the garden wall". 

March 28. Very warm. For the first 
time this year we sat with windows open. 
How soon one condemns and forgets, stoves, 
overcoats, furs, and the like, rejoicing in that 
solar heat which will shortly be too great. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 71 

March 2g. Ploughed a strip for peas. 
The first furrow is an epoch in the year. 
Though you ploughed the field the last of 
November, it is not the same; frost has been 
at work, and merged the furrows together. 
After three months rest the plough has to be 
diligently scraped from adhering rust dur- 
ing three or four bouts. A spot in the mid- 
dle of the mold board generally holds out 
last, with a streak of earth streaming from 
it, like the geological crag and tail. At last 
this slips away, the furrow slice runs off 
clean, and the plough breast flashes like 
Lancelot's shield. 

When iron mold-boards first came In, it 
was claimed that they poisoned the land. It 
is difficult to see how this notion could have 
arisen, unless that when clay was plowed 
while too wet, the metal would plaster or 
puddle the furrow-slice more completely. 
Certainly the dirt would adhere In greater 
quantity to the wood, leaving more to be 
scraped off at the turning; thereby produc- 
ing those huge banks of earth which Jessopp 
describes along the Norfolk headlands, piled 
up by the accretions of five hundred years or 
more. That old fashioned member of long 
measure, the furlong, or furrow-long (660 
feet) was supposed to Indicate the distance 
a team could plow without stopping to 
breathe, and therefore, approximately, the 
breadth of a field; though It Is evident that a 
more variant unit could hardly be devised. 
The old plan of harnessing the plow-horses 



72 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

tandem, and having a boy to drive themV 
while of great convenience in the matter of 
keeping the furrow, and saving harness, 
must have been uncommonly hard on the 
rear animal, who, at the turn, would have to 
pull the plow for a time alone, without the 
help of his mates. We only see tandems 
now at the two extremes of society — the 
Horse Show, and the tow-path. 

March jo. Planted peas. We have of- 
ten done this on St. Patrick's day, but this 
year the season is unusually late. The seed 
must be covered deeply to keep it from the 
birds. Crows do not seem to care for peas, 
but fowls and pigeons do. The latter would 
soon make away with the planting if they 
could dig; but their weak little pink feet are 
incapable of scratching. 

Whether orchards should be kept in grass 
or not — whether it is worth while to try and 
raise hoed crops under young trees — have 
long been debated questions. On the whole, 
I doubt the wisdom of the latter practice, 
unless one's portion of land is so small that 
one can fling the hoe across it. I have seen 
fine strawberries and asparagus, and nearly 
all sorts of vegetables grown under young 
apples trees; but the roots get in the way of 
the truck, and the bark gets in the way of the 
blade, and if horse or plow are to be brought 
in, few workers will do justice to high and 
low alike. If the trees are trimmed up so 
that a horse can go under them, that is too 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 73 

high for their good; and if they are not, the 
horse will trample the crop. Then, if the 
soil is kept loose, a strong wind is apt to blow 
the trees over when heavily laden with fruit 
and leaf. Nothing can be more dishearten- 
ing than this, and to avert it you let the grass 
grow in the rows ; it rapidly spreads out, and 
soon you think it will do to grow one row of 
truck between each row of trees. Soon after 
this determination has been reached, the or- 
chard gets entirely into sod. 

The young orchard once in sod, what shall 
be done with it? "Be careful, my friend, not 
to cut and carry away that hay", says one 
writer. This means that either the hay must 
be cut and left on the ground, which seems 
a cruel pity, and exposes you to the great evil 
of mulch, its harborage of vermin and in- 
sects, or else the grass must be pastured 
down. Pigs root up the ground in a slovenly 
manner, are themselves unpleasing to look 
upon, and need the tightest kind of fencing 
to keep them in. Cows, yet more horses, 
will gnaw and break small trees, and when 
they begin fruiting, develop the most as- 
tounding capacity for stretching their necks 
to reach apples no larger than grapes. Sheep, 
perhaps, are the ideal pasturers, but sheep In 
New Jersey are practically unattainable. The 
dogs have got the upper paw to such an ex- 
tent that no one tries to reverse the position. 
So the cattle are turned into the orchard for 
a little while in spring and late fall, and the 
grass goes down before the rapid encroach- 



74 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

ments of weeds and briers, among which the 
apples are hard to find, and by which tres- 
passers are heartened to "think the fruit was 
wild". 

March j/. Burnt some dead grass off 
foot of garden. This is very soon affected 
by evening dew. As soon as the sun goes 
down grass dampens, and the fire will not 
run. The time for burning over the salt 
meadows ends legally with March; and in 
years gone by we used to see the Eastern 
horizon glowing with the meadow fires for 
the last ten days of the month. Of course, 
the heavy sedge and three-square are not so 
much affected by damp as the fine grass 
above mentioned. 

This is a comfortable month for the farm- 
er. As a writer in Am. Agriculturist has 
said, 

"The sun may be tricky an' fitful. 
The wind it may blister an' parch. 
The mud may be up to your boot-tops. 
But the best of the months is ol' March. 
Then farmers has some little measure 
Of comfort, an' that sort o' thing; 
So gimme the season, for pleasure, 
When the frost's comin' out in the spring." 

April I. Washing vehicles. This seems 
labor thrown away during the winter, when 
the wagon would be just as bad as ever after 
going a hundred yards. So much accumulates 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 75 

on the wheels during winter till they resem- 
ble those of ancient chariots; but with April 
washing is spasmodically renewed. One year, 
living on a very sandy ifarm, and wishing to 
set out a bed of Jucunda strawberries, which 
are said to do best on clay land, we took the 
vehicles to a spot near the barnyard on re- 
turning from each trip over the clay roads, 
and pounded them with sticks. By spring 
there was a heap of the desired soil, which 
we dug into the bed. 

April 2. S. As, in walking a rail, curb- 
stone, or other narrow support, where care- 
ful balance is required, the eye is generally 
fixed on a point from six to eight feet ahead, 
so in reading aloud, the eye is about that 
number of words before the tongue. This 
may be confirmed by observing readers 
whose locution is from any cause defective, 
when the word mispronounced usually takes 
the shape of its sixth or eighth successor. 

April J. Plowed asparagus bed. Diffi- 
culty in going deep enough to turn the grass, 
and shallow enough not to tear the aspara- 
gus. It is the American way to bring the 
plough into the garden. 

**Long was the day of Old Sir Spade, 
But now the arms to wield him fail.'' 

In "Rob Roy" Andrew Fairservice is rep- 
resented as "trenching up the sparry gra§s*\ 



76 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

I once repeated to Frank Cook, the English 
boy before mentioned, the Italian proverb 
"The plough has a point of iron, the spade 
an edge of gold". "Oh", was his Gordian 
reply, "Italians will say anything". 

April 4. Sowed oats on Farfield. This 
tract contains about six and a half acres, is 
mostly a shaly clay, tending to gravelly loam 
at the south end; had gone untilled for sev- 
eral years, tumbling down to poor grass; was 
broken up last year and planted with corn, 
which made a small crop; was ploughed in 
November, after the corn was off, and now, 
despite the heavy snows of the past winter, 
is hard and dry. Placing the bags of seed 
oats in a line across the middle of the field, 
I begin to sow, carrying about a peck at a 
time in a tin pail. The cast is about eight 
feet wide, and when, as now, the day is calm, 
one can return on one's last track over the 
field, and then move over a rod, or make for 
a guidon pole placed on the other side. 
When the wind blows, it is necessary always 
to keep on the weather side of your cast, 
and fling backhanded half the time. 

To preserve balance one must deliver a 
handful each time the left leg comes for- 
ward; and accurately to spread the seed, the 
hand must be opened slowly, as it comes 
palm upward, so that the grain may scatter 
in the air and still tumble outward, if at all, 
after it strikes the earth. One can cover 
about two acres an hour in this way; and 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 77 

though the work be monotonous, it is not 
lonely, for beside the sower walk the men of 
Anglia, and Galilee, and Egypt, and Harran. 

April 5. V. followed me with the disk 
harrow yesterday afternoon, at once cutting 
up the field, and covering in the seed. The 
above tool resembles a dozen dinner plates 
of steel set on edge in a frame drawn by 
horses. The axles being set by shifting lev- 
ers slightly out of true. The above plates 
cut directly into the soil, but lift obliquely 
out of it, loosening up the land with great 
rapidity, and turning the bricklike field into 
a loose, mealy seed-bed. This should be fol- 
lowed by the smoothing harrow, and that 
again by the roller, but showers today make 
it necessary to defer these finishing touches. 

Porte Crayon, in one of his Southern 
sketches in Harper's fifty years ago, de- 
scribes and pictures an Old Virginia labor- 
saving machine. The force and equipment 
consisted of a man, a little darkey, and a 
horse; a bag of seed, a harrow, a halter, and 
a piece of rope some twelve feet long. The 
horse being endowed with collar, traces, and 
the aforesaid halter, the man hitched him to 
the harrow with the rope, and then got upon 
his back, facing the tail, and holding the bag 
of seed in front of him. The little darkey 
then led the horse back and forth across the 
field at the proper lines, while the man scat- 
tered from his bag the seed, which was im- 
mediately covered by the advancing harrow. 



78 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

The advantages of this plan are great and 
obvious. The seed Is covered at once, not 
left exposed to birds and weather. The lit- 
tle darkey is worked into a job he could 
neither shirk nor neglect. The man has only 
to cross the field once, and does not have to 
carry the seed. The most overworked party 
Is the horse, who has not only to drag the 
harrow, but carry the man, and the seed as 
well. But every device has Its drawbacks, 
and this was certainly Ingenious. I say was, 
for one may opine it did not survive the war. 

April 6. Clover Is sown In wheat at about 
the same time as oats. The process Is very 
similar, except that the cast is narrower, and 
instead of a handful of seed, only so much 
Is taken as can be grasped with two fingers 
and thumb. No man's eyes or ears have 
much failed him as long as he can see and 
hear the clover seed fall. 

April 7. Getting up frame for new hen 
house. This should have been done last 
month, but the winter frosts struck so deep 
that we are only just now able to set posts 
in the ground. The same cause has pre- 
vented the usual March mending of fence. 

Saw a string of canal mules going to work. 
The canal tow-path has, of course, nothing 
to do with any part of the human foot 
(though the other bank of the canal is some- 
times called the heel-path) but referred to 
the tow, or rope, by which the boat waj^ 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 79 

dragged. When two boats meet, as most 
people know, one driver slackens speed, and 
lets his rope drag under the keel of the other 
craft. Passenger canal-boats were not infre- 
quent in the 40's and 50's, and must have 
been pleasant enough, when the weather was 
fine, and the traveller in no hurry. Gayly 
painted, clean and commodious, and drawn 
by sturdy animals, who mostly kept to a trot, 
they probably attained twice the speed of the 
freighters. Of those scenes little has come 
down to us except the warning cry of "Low 
Bridge!" still to be heard in jest, which, in 
its day would cause the instant prostration of 
the proudest and the fairest. Nor were 
these humiliations confined to the human 
race. It is said that a term on the canal 
would break the spirit of the most intracta- 
ble horse; it was the inevitable destination 
of a hopelessly vicious brute, as the galleys 
of a mediaeval reprobate, or the South of a 
bad Virginia negro. 

April 8. Getting home fertilizer (man- 
ure) from manus, that which is applied by 
the hand, as contrasted with old fashioned 
dung, that which is flung or dashed down, 
with or without implements, e. g. "Ding 
down Tantallon", and for the past of this "I 
hae dung down", "It was dung down", see 
Scott, passim. 

April 9. S. Saw first dandelions today. 
Almost invariably the first bats appear at the 



8o A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

same time. Apparently an equal level of 
temperature agrees with both. I have noted 
this for many years; but today the flitter- 
mouse was not forth-coming; or, which is 
much more likely, I was not on hand at the 
proper time. 

Few things could be less alike than the 
flower and the flyer; yet the sun which rises 
upon one descends upon the other. The 
modern traveller (the heroic explorers of 
old belong to another class) is formed by 
leisure, opportunity, and a certain easiness 
in pecuniary matters — like that plant whose 
seed-vessels burst in heat, so explodes his 
shell of habit when the sun of prosperity 
shines warmly, and forthwith he is scattered 
to the four winds. "It's a small world" 
quoth he bromidically, as he goes to and fro 
over the earth, and finds therein many de- 
lightful persons resembling himself. Like 
the man in the cabinet lined with mirrors, his 
reflections are numerous, and all alike. No 
wonder he feels like Sancho Pansa's hazel- 
nut inhabitant of a mustard-seed world. 

April 10. Today went over the oats on 
Farfield with a smoothing harrow; an oper- 
ation deferred for six days by the recent 
showers. It began to rain about three P. 
M., but I kept on with the light team (the 
heavy one was still dragging the disk har- 
row) leaving six inch gaps between each 
"strike", stamping on every large clod I 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 8i 

could reach, and occasionally scraping my 
foot over a wider balk than usual, to leave 
the surface as smooth as possible. I got 
through near six, both I and the horses pret- 
ty well soaked; but If It had not been done 
after this shifty fashion, it might not have 
been done at all. 

April II. Fencing. Herman Melville, in 
one of his early contributions to Harper's, 
opines that the prevalence of insanity among 
farmers Is due to the Sisyphaean task, recur- 
ring every spring, of repairing rotten fences 
with rotten rails. "Against the fence the old 
man was mending", says he, "were butting 
a number of half grown calves, or rather 
mangy hair trunks, possessed of the devil. 
Occasionally they would break through, 
when he would drop his work and pursue 
them with a fragment of the rail, huge as Go- 
liath's spear, but light as cork. At the first 
flourish it fell into pieces". 

April 12. Set posts for wire fence. I 
found that I could dig a hole two to two and 
a half feet deep, set the post and fill In the 
earth tamping It properly, in ten minutes, or 
about five per hour, as I had to carry each 
post from some distance. Of course, in sum- 
mer, when the gravel is hard and dry, it 
would take longer. In afternoon we stretched 
the wires upon them. 

This is a job for mild weather, as, if they 
were tightened on a frosty day, they would 
expand and slacken in summer. 



82 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

April ij. Today applied "M's Top 
Dressing for Grass and Grain" to three 
acres of wheat. The grain has come though 
poorly, being badly winter killed, where the 
drifts did not protect it, and in many places 
heaved quite out of the ground. Many for- 
lorn little wheat plants, half green, half red, 
lie flat on the earth, only moored to it by one 
slender fibre of root. I went carefully over 
the whole three acres, carrying the fertilizer 
in a bucket, and scattering it with a small 
hand scoop. The stuff is at any rate evenly 
distributed, about a hundred pounds per 
acre. We shall see what good it does. 

April 14. Went over Farfield with the 
roller, ten days after the oats were sown. 
This is an unprecented interval, but constant 
light showers on sticky clay have hindered us 
till now. A few days more, and the oats 
would have broken ground, when it could not 
have been done at all. The process is de- 
sirable, not only to fine the soil and break the 
large clods, but to crush down stones, corn- 
butts, etc., into the earth, and make a clean 
path for the roller. On the whole, our oats 
have been very badly put in this year. 

April 75. Spreading barnyard refuse on 
the sod intended for corn this year. This 
was one of the tasks of Chaucer's Plough- 
man. 

**0f dung he had spread ful many a fother", 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 83 

How differently do the sanitarian and the ag- 
riculturist regard a muckheap. 1 he former 
considers it a menace to life and a breeding 
place of diseases; the latter as a precious 
treasure to be diligently cared for. No farm- 
er ever has enough of it, and when he can 
cover a small spot thickly, he knows that a 
large spot must go hungry. The widely ad- 
vertised manure spreaders do the work more 
thoroughly, but hardly faster. Two good 
men can spread a load in ten to twelve min- 
utes, though I admit that they sometimes get 
in each other's way. I have a scar on the 
side of my middle finger, where the tine of 
t'other man's fork struck me when thus en- 
gaged, thirty years ago. 

April 16. S. Cold, snow squalls; proba- 
bly the last for this season. Lowell puts it 
that first the maples, then the willows yellow, 
then the horse-chestnuts buds open; "An' 
arter this ther's only blossom snows". 

The farmer's luxuries may be soon enum- 
erated. Plenty of air and space, silence and 
quiet, the use of a horse, fresh fruit and veg- 
etables, feather beds. He also has a good 
deal of leisure, in the sense that he can take 
two or three hours off at almost any time 
without its making much difference. But 
long absences are beyond him. Other men 
are held to their work by a chain, as it were, 
which now and then is unhooked and laid by. 
He is tethered by a rubber band, which will 
always stretch z little, but never lets him go 



84 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

far, and the further he gets away the harder 
it pulls. The milking of cows is the strong- 
est strand of this tether, since that is a thing 
which must be done at stated times, and few 
can do ; also the knowledge that his best man 
walks away in his shoes, and dislike of pay- 
ing for things which are wasting at home. In 
the Middle Ages farmers had many things 
which only the wealthiest townsmen could 
procure, but they grew fewer with advancing 
civilization. And the first few things enum- 
erated above are become distasteful to the 
majority nowadays, as probably they always 
were to the young. 

April I J. Cutting potato sets. An up 
start and a parvenue this among vegetables. 
The two hundred years during which it has 
been generally cultivated have brought it no 
traditions; and it lacks even the uncanny in- 
terest which the love apple gave to the still 
more recent tomato. John Ridd, in "Lorna 
Doone" cir. 1685, speaks of enjoying fried 
"batatas", and they were cultivated in Ger- 
many before the Seven Years War. Dis- 
tracted Ireland favored this crop as being 
safe alike from the enemy's torch and the 
enemy's horses' teeth. I can cut about one 
thousand sets per hour. 

April 18. Ploughing for potatoes. Weath- 
er still cold and backward. A chestnut tree 
just levelled, had some seventy annual rings, 
and was about the same number of feet in 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 85 

height. The tree had made its greatest 
growth between thirty and fifty, the rings be- 
tween those years being quite broad, and 
those before and after very narrow. By the 
same rule, our biggest chestnut, about five 
feet in diameter, must be at least two hun- 
dred years old. 

April ig. Showers leave a green deposit, 
like slate pencil dust on the wheat ground 
where I sprinkled the fertilizer. I fear this 
bodes no good for the young clover plants, 
now just breaking ground. "The leaf-buds 
on the vine are woolly". 

The climbers and creepers own the grape 
vine as their king. This noble mountaineer 
used, according to Virgil, to be trained upon 
elm trees. Whether one tree was allotted 
to each vine, or poles and cords were 
stretched between them, is not made perfect- 
ly clear. The ivy (poison and other) Vir- 
ginia creeper, and Bignonia, come next in 
magnitude, but instead of tendrils, they hold 
by sucking discs, bringing in nutriment as 
well as support. Then come the coilers, such 
as the bean and hop, but even among them 
there is a difference — one turns from right 
to left, the other from left to right. The 
bindweed is irregular in coiling, and some- 
times where no support presents itself, a 
mass of the stuff may be seen combining for 
sustenance, and sending a point of heads into 
the air something like the twist we make with 
moistened finger and thumb to get a large 



86 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

thread through a small needle. Both this 
fieldhand cousin of the morning-glory and 
the sweet potato vine will sometimes form a 
broad palm near the tip, as if to clutch what 
they cannot enring. Lastly, the eminently 
parasitic dodder lives on its host, despises its 
own root, and dies as it goes like one of those 
engines which carry their own track. 

April 20. Put in one acre of potatoes with 
a planter. First time I ever used one. The 
affair, something like a big tandem bicycle, is 
drawn by two horses, and ridden by two 
men. One of these drives the team, the oth- 
er regulates the passage of the seed from a 
hopper between them. Down below, first 
comes a small plough, then a tube down 
which the fertilizer streams, then a rake to 
mix this with the soil, then the passage for 
descent of the potato sets, then two disks 
which throw the soil over them, and finally a 
small roller to pack the ridge. It leaves the 
land in beautiful shape, but on the whole I 
doubt if more labor is saved in the end, con- 
sidering the charge for the machine and the 
time spent taking it home again. 

Threshing machines, of a kind, seem to 
have been in use from time immemorial. The 
"fan'' of Scripture was probably a mere im- 
plement; the first Scotch winnowing mill is 
alluded to in "Old Mortality", about 1690; 
and Haggard speaks of an English engrav- 
ing of such an article, not very much later. 
A horse-rake, known as the "Wo-back", 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 87 

from the constant halt and retreat necessary 
to Its operation, was In use In the fifties, and 
was succeeded about '65, by the "revol- 
ver", a huge double-toothed wooden comb, 
which could be thrown over by a knowing 
jerk of the trip-handle on the part of the 
trudging driver. Then came the steel spring- 
tooth, where the farmer rides, and periodi- 
cally pulls a lever to raise the jingling teeth; 
and lastly the side delivery rake, which sends 
forth the entire crop In one great twisted 
rope. But this, with all other complicated 
engineering. Is subject to attacks of the 
nerves. The old tool was like a savage — 
broken, or sound — wounded, or well. But 
the complicated machine. If, as some one has 
said. It seems to have a soul, seems to have 
sicknesses too, and sometimes of kinds un- 
dlscoverable by those who most profess to 
comprehend their Intricacies. 

April 21. Considering how for many 
years, "getting Into a rut" has been a fitting 
description of stupid conservatism. It Is sing- 
ular that much of our boasted progress 
should consist In making ruts all over the 
world, lining them with Iron, and riding 
about on them. 

April 22. Hearing a noise in the shrub- 
bery this evening, I found an Inebriated per- 
son trying to lean gracefully against the arb- 
or vitae hedge, which naturally gave way 
and let him down. Getting him on his legs, 



88 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

I supported him a long way down the road, 
and at length left him apparently well under 
way for the town. I heard afterwards, how- 
ever, that he spent the night in a field. 

There Is an old story of an inebriate who, 
having procured free physic for his sick chil- 
dren by a well-planned tale of woe, appeared 
next morning before the benevolent donor, 
weeping, and exhibiting a broken phial, 

"How came this, James?" 

"Why, ye see, Docther, as I wint home 
last avenin' I felt greatly tired, and lay down 
to slape In a field. And wid that some vIU- 
yan came and sow'd corn all around me, and 
thin turned in the hogs. And they rooted 
up the ground, and toss'd me over, and 
throw'd me about and broke the phial, and 
now the poor childer must suffer, d'ye mind." 

April 2J. S. Oats breaking ground. In 
some places one can only make them out by 
stooping and looking for their shadows when 
the sun Is low. In other spots a light green 
tinge Is already visible over the surface. 
Wheat is looking better than could have been 
expected, but I fear that grey slop from the 
fertilizer has killed the clover seed, which 
should now be In evidence. 

April 2^. The vestry went to parish 
meeting, and voted for themselves as their 
successors, with gratifying unanimity. When 
you have got all the men of a parish in the 
vestry, and all the women in the choir, it 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 89 

stands to reason you will have few high pri- 
vates. 

April 2^. Mending fence. In these parts 
we put three rails to a "panel" as the space 
between two posts is called. In Pennsyl- 
vania and some other states they put four or 
five. The old idea of a fence was "horse 
high, bull strong, and pig (or sheep) tight", 
and New Jersey has probably poorer 
horses, weaker bulls, and fewer sheep than 
almost any other state. 

Having selected three rails of equal 
length, study their position. The poorest 
rail, weak, splintered, crooked, should go at 
the bottom. For the middle a crooked or 
mis-shapen rail will do very well, if it is only 
stout. For the top rail choose your best, 
shapely, straight and strong. If there is any 
crook at all, turn the convexity upward. Not 
only does this make a neater and higher 
fence, but the rail's constant endeavor to 
turn binds the ends more together in the post 
hole. 

Turned the cows to pasture today. As a 
rule, when first turned to grass, they feed 
eagerly for a few minutes, then gallop wildly 
round their enclosing fence, as if to assure 
themselves that they do not dream, and that 
the dull monotony of stall and barn-yard is 
over. 

April 26: Henry James has observed that 
the action in Hawthorne seems to take place 



90 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

uncannily late In the afternoon, and always 
winter outside. But do not most American 
writers tend that way? With the exception 
of Lowell's "June" In Sir Launfal, how little 
they have to say of our long, hot, summer, 
how much of our long, cold winter. Long- 
fellow, Whittler, Bryant and Poe will give 
you many frost pieces to one splash of sun. 
Emerson and Holmes have the same bias, 
though not so decidedly, and even Lowell, 
despite the fine exception above noted, 
turned oftenest to the North. The minor 
poets, Lanier, Cella Thaxter, Drake, Bay- 
ard Taylor, are perhaps of brighter mood. 

April 27. Light rain during the night. 
This has been a fairly moist and mild April. 
"True to name" as the saying is, and yet 
March was so dry that notwithstanding the 
heavy snow of winter the soil Is already less 
damp than I could wish. 

The Old-time agriculturist seems to have 
needed feeding oftener than the modern, 
to judge by the constant "nuncheons", 
"snacks", etc., which figure so largely In the 
accounts of reapers' ways by a person of 
quality looking on, and perhaps deigning to 
partake. But "little and often" may be a 
good rule for those undergoing severe toil, 
and at any rate, it utilized the breathing 
spells occuring about every three hours. A 
laborer now departed, who flourished in the 
8o's, having cradled since dawn, was wont 
about 10 A. M., to call for six hard boiled 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 91 

eggs, which having swallowed In a trice, 
without intervention of spirituous fluids, he 
would work on until 2 P. M., then knocking 
off for the day. 

April 28. Sowing beets and carrots by 
hand. The ground was preparec] with the 
potato planter, omitting the potatoes; that Is, 
merely throwing a ridge with it over a line of 
fertilizer. This is made smooth and level 
with the hand rake, and then the sower walks 
along the top of the ridge, taking quick, short 
steps, bending over as far as possible, and 
dribbling the seed with one hand just before 
his toes. Having reached the end, he turns 
and walks back over it, treading in the gaps 
of the footprints just made. This packs the 
whole row, and gives the back a chance to 
straighten. This job is almost invariably 
done to the accompaniment of humming 
gnats, who appear just about this time and 
sting, sharply, when they can get a lodgment 
in human hair or horses' ears. They disap- 
pear in a week or two, but while they last are 
worse than mosquitoes. Saw the first but- 
terfly a day or two ago. A Swedish boy who 
worked here once used to repeat a saying of 
his country which might thus be put Into Eng- 
lish verse, 

"The earliest butterfly you see, 
Of his color that year your clothes will be". 

April 2g. Not only the prosperity of a 
jest, but of a comparison, lies In the ear that 



92 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

hears it. The cow-boy at the horse show, 
who said the Shire staUion looked as if he 
was wearing two pair of chaps, could never 
have commanded a very large audience. 

Possibly the change in taste concerning 
oratory is not better illustrated than by the ■ 

anecdote? told of our two most popular | 

Presidents. Andrew Jackson, in obedience 
to a hint that the crowd wouldn't be satisfied 
without a little Latin, exclaiming 'mid thun- 
derous applause, "Propria quae maribus — 
E pluribus unum — Sine qua non — Serus in 
coelum redeas", and Theodore Roosevelt 
sitting up o' nights, of his own notion, to 
study Arabic, that he might astound his au- 
dience with a proverb in their mother tongue. 

April JO. Wonderful are the struggles of 
illustrators to represent that which they do 
not comprehend. Harness and wagon gear- 
ing are great stumbling blocks to them. They 
generally get the bridle and collar tolerably 
correct, but the holdbacks and whiffle trees 
are marvelous to look upon. The wagon 
wheels and body are done with a light heart, 
but when they come to the setting on of the 
pole and springs they walk among pitfalls, 
and sometimes resort to the shift of covering 
all with a cloud of dust. Even when an ef- 
fort at the truth has been made, it is not al- 
ways intelligent. In a recent illustrated edi- 
tion of "Waverly" the Mac'Ivors are repre- 
sented charging over a stubble field at Pres- 
ton. The artist had evidently gone to Na- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 93 

ture, and consequently the stubble stood in 
straight lines, as the modern drill leaves it, 
instead of being evenly dispersed over the 
ground, as hand sowing would have left it in 

1745- 

May I. Jane Austen is perhaps of all 
great authors the least accessible to natural 
scenery. John Dashwood in "Sense and Sen- 
sibility" clearing away the old thorns to 
make room for his green house, the "pretty- 
ish wilderness" and "park ten miles round" 
in "Pride and Prejudice", the stormy after- 
noon in "Emma", the stormy night in 
"Northanger Abbey", the "farmer meaning 
to have spring again", in "Persuasion", how 
few and light the touches are. She something 
resembled a Venetian of 1500 in his commer- 
cial instinct, his pride in monopoly, and his 
obliviousness to Vasco di Gama. Her coun- 
try's frigates were to her machines to earn 
prize-money in, her country's church an in- 
stitution to provide for younger sons, her 
country's soldiers persons whose flogging 
bored her. She had a mighty genius for 
smugness; and in her narrow path trod, as 
Tennyson said, "next to Shakespeare". 

May 2. Ploughing the three acre. This 
is a neglected old field falling steeply away to 
north and west from a clay bluff. Covered 
with sprouts and briars, incessant work with 
the grubbing hoe is necessary to get the 
plough along. Thistles are also numerous, 



94 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

but this neighborhood does not seem to fav- 
or their Increase and probably one year's cul- 
tivation win do for them. Some men in 
ploughing hold the reins In one hand, this Is 
awkward In turning where one must put 
one's whole strength to the stilts; some round 
the back, which spoils the horses' mouths; 
some round the neck, which Imperils the driv- 
er. I have seen a man dragged clear over his 
plough by the breaking of the clevis pin, 
whereupon the released team rushed for- 
ward. 

May J. Finished ploughing the three 
acre. As the Northern Farmer said "I ha' 
stubb'd Thorneby waste", and certainly 
there Is pleasure In reclaiming a bit of land 
like that, and making it again do its share. 
It has been observed that newly cleared land 
always seems to have risen up. I suppose 
we look at the tops of the bushes and briars, 
and think the ground they grew In lower than 
It Is; just as a large piece of water always 
seems deep. Perhaps If the ocean were sud- 
denly drained away Its shallowness, not Its 
depth, would terrify us. High wind today, 
rapidly drying the land, which needs It not. 

May 4. V. ploughed, I rolled. This Is desir- 
able to pack the newly turned furrow slices 
down side by side so that the harrow may not 
tear them up. Hawthorne says that he had 
trodden every square foot of Brook Farm, 
and I believe T have done that by Cherry 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 95 

Lawn, though perhaps not yet by Clifton. 
Ploughing a field twice would do it. It is an 
old saying ''No manure like the master's 
foot". 

May 5. Tanagers are to be seen hopping 
over the newly plowed sod. Generally in 
pairs. They are much in evidence at this 
time, but unnoticed for the rest of the year. 
Conspicuous and tame as they are, I never 
saw one shot or shot at. This, I fear, is not 
so much owing to the gunner's tender heart 
as his tender feet, which disincline him to 
walk over plowed land. 

It is true that ploughing is traditionally 
the task of all others to be done barefoot, 
but this emphasizes the above statement. 
Crossing ploughed land shod blisters the 
feet and spoils the boots. Wet earth seems 
to eat the leather, and the unforeseen twists 
and slips induced by the unequal solidity of 
the earth bring the weight to bear on unac- 
customed spots. But the plough-man does 
not cross ploughed land. He treads the fur- 
row, a pathway cut between sod and loam 
for himself alone. He follows a premise 
which he cannot see, and leaves a conclusion 
soon to be obliterated. Like the early Chris- 
tians, he turns the world upside down. The 
remarks made above touching the failure of 
artists with wagons apply also to ploughed 
land. Leech was a good delineator of hunt- 
ing scenes, and knew his subject, yet one of 
his sketches, representing an indignant hunts- 



96 A FARMER^S NOTE BOOK 

man hastening to chastise the silence of a 
scare-crow, shows the striding horse only 
covering five or six furrows, which could not 
much exceed a foot in width, while five or 
six more make all the remaining distance be- 
tween scare-crow and hedge, which, by per- 
spective, would be at least forty feet. 

May 6. Carted out last manure. Seven- 
ty-two loads. A stalled animal will make 
about ten loads of manure per year. As there 
are compensations everywhere on the farm, 
this is supposed to pay for the time spent in 
tending them. And how much tending a 
horse gets. He Is watered, fed, cleaned, 
harnessed where he stands; he has only to do 
his bare work. A man has to exert himself 
considerably to eat, to bathe, to dress; and 
then do his work besides. 

We all have hoofs. Yours and mine num- 
ber a score, and we call them nails; the cow 
and deer have sixteen, for not every one has 
observed that a little above and behind the 
traditional ''cloven hoof" are two smaller 
horny processes, which only take the earth 
when the owner sinks deep In wet soil. The 
dog Is In like case, at least the majority. I 
know not how far Moses' rule applies to the 
"mule-hoofed" swine of the south, which 
neither part the hoof, nor chew the cud. 

The horse gathers three nails Into one; 
the callous growth just below the fetlock Is 
his fourth finger, and the spots of horn on 
the inside of each leg, a little below the hock, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 97 

a little above the foreknee, are his thumbs. 
His knee is our wrist; his hock is our heel. 
His elbow is close up against his side, and 
the shoulder joint tied in, so as effectually to 
prevent his ever taking that defiant attitude 
known as "akimbo". If we would imitate a 
rearing horse, we must stand on the tips of 
our toes (not the balls) bring our knees close 
up against the short ribs, drop the wrist and 
bend the fingers backward, and all this with a 
load of about thirty pounds on our back. 

May 7. Iridescence on the neck of a pig- 
eon (where perhaps it attains its highest 
development) may be also observed on a 
horse's mane, In a strong light; perhaps, too 
on human hair, though this I have never no- 
ticed. 

May 8. Met two neighbors on the road, 
mother and son, who are supposed not to be 
"all there", and was struck by their staring 
eyes. Why should deficiency of mind ex- 
press itself in redundancy of feature? Do 
open doors indicate a feeble tenant? 

Great men do not always impress by their 
countenances. An honored ancestor, now 
past away, used to say that he only saw Dan- 
iel Webster's coat and heels by looking over 
a hotel balcony as he (Mr. W.) was enter- 
ing the porch below. And all he could re- 
member of Dickens was his green trousers. 
Longfellow was described by another rela- 
tive as a short young man with a tig nose. 



98 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

Chesterton has well observed that we always 
expect notabilities to be younger than they 
are, because they were young when they did 
the deeds that made them notable. 

Kingsley is said to have been one of the 
few men who did not disappoint in this way. 
Caesar's weeping at the sight of Alexander's 
statue, because, though then older than Phil- 
ip's warlike son was when he died, he had 
performed no such exploits, is a curious in- 
trospective reversal of this sort; though the 
fruit was not there, he lamented at being 
past another's bearing season. That he 
eventually produced a plenteous crop is be- 
yond question; but perhaps he had never 
done so but for these fructifying showers. 

May g. Continued ploughing, working up 
toward the road. Longfield (with the excep- 
tion of an acre at the near end, where grass 
was sown after cabbage four years ago, and 
made a fair crop) was in poor drilled corn 
in 1902, and then tumbled down to red top 
grass, which, when seen alone, generally in- 
dicates either very poor or very wet land. 
The three acre before mentioned also forms 
part of it, and has been still longer out of cul- 
tivation. The whole (between eight and 
nine acres) will now be planted to corn, and 
cultivated as one. 

May 10. Hauled over 300-lb. stone 
struck in plowing. It is too heavy for one to 
move, and thus has remained in situ since the 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 99 

land was first cleared. It is a yellow sand- 
stone, flat on two sides, otherwise roughly 
triangular, and covered with scars and 
scratches, left by the plowshares of a hun- 
dred years — rude cuneiform inscriptions, 
graving on It the jest or the curse of those it 
hindered or halted. 

May II. Despite a little shower last night 
the ground is getting very dry again, and 
wood fires are becoming frequent. Almost 
every day we see a heavy column of smoke 
rising from the scrub-oak lands south and 
east. Some of these are from the railways, 
rapidly increasing near the clay pits, some 
are set by mischievous boys. Both these in- 
cendiary forces, are bound to grow worse; so 
what hope can there ever be of reforesting 
the land? Every year more and more of the 
wretched dead poles that are left fall down, 
and furnish fresh fuel against the next 
drought. I remember one very pretty spot 
on what was known as the saw mill brook, 
which was a dam one hundred feet long and 
six or eight high, said to have been made by 
one woman with a wheelbarrow in the thir- 
ties. There was a beautiful little grove of 
red pines, thick and dark above, but free of 
underbrush or ground branches, crowsfoot 
and spinning-vine grew abundantly, and hard 
by was the only wild holly bush I know of in 
these parts. Now it has been exploited by 
the Pyrogranite Co. and what is not clay-pit 
or track is a mass of charred desolation. 



loo A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

Only around Lakewood, where enormous 
sums are spent, by wealthy stockjobbers and 
malades imaglnaries, do we see what might 
be done with the woods. 

May 12. Plowing harder and harder, the 
share has to be renewed every two or three 
days, the land turns up in great lumps or 
breaks before the plough in cracks, instead 
of rolling away in a smooth brown slice, and 
dust puffs from under the turning furrow. 
Things are not yet as bad as in the terrible 
drought of 1903, when from April 25th to 
June 17th there was scarcely a drop, but we 
seem tending that way. 

May /J. The above lament was followed 
by a nice shower during the night, which for 
the moment suffices. It did not go very deep, 
and the earth turns up dry from the depth of 
six Inches, reminding one of the robe of 
Dante's angel "the color of ashes", or earth 
dug dry. 

May 14, S. Beautiful weather. Heard 
the first thrush singing today. In afternoon 
saw a humming-bird, and in evening rose the 
voice of the whip-poor-will. This last fowl, 
besides his well-known onomatopoetic cry, 
has a kind of querying, chuckling note audi- 
ble but a few feet away, not unlike that ut- 
tered by a cock, when guarding a laying hen. 

May 75. Finished plowing sod, going all 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK loi 

around the piece and ploughing Inward to 
make a neat finish. Considerable work with 
the grubbing hoe was also needed to break 
the crust of poison ivy which for years had 
been circulating among the fences. In the 
evening had the first thunder shower of the 
season. Meadow foxtail (Alopecurus crls- 
tatus) coming into blossom. Land merry 
with showers. 

May 1 6. Showery again. We tried the 
smoothing harrow this morning, but it 
dragged the wet soil to a mortar-like condi- 
tion, and had to be abandoned after a few 
bouts. Set a hen on our first clutch of eggs 
nearly three weeks ago. After sixteen days 
she wearied of the task, left the nest, and the 
eggs became quite cold before I discovered 
her absence. This Is frequently the end of 
one's hopes, but I procured another hen, put 
her In the deserter's place, and now a faint 
peeping can be heard. Later she hatched 
eight chicks. Many years ago we had a hen 
sitting on eggs, and twenty days passed with 
no sign of life. On the twenty-second she 
came off to feed as usual, went back to her 
nest, hopped down into It, and came out on the. 
floor carrying an egg in her beak by a small 
hole pecked through the shell, and broke It. 
The egg contained a chicken, which, not yet 
quite ready for its debut, struggled a few 
minutes and then died. Apparently satisfied 
by this test that she was not being imposed 
on, the hen returned to her nest, sat two days 



102 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

longer, and brought off a brood. This was 
reason, not Instinct. She could compute that 
the usual time of Incubation had passed, and 
she could judge by her experiment that there 
was still hope. 

May ij. Considering Thoreau's intense 
and Intimate love of nature, it seems strange 
that man's defacement of her beauty affected 
him so little. The railroad cutting, the tele- 
graph line, gave pleasure to his eye and ear. 
Nor did individual men irk him beyond en- 
durance. The Irish laborer whose shanty he 
bought, the chopper, sundry farmers, have 
tolerance from him. But when two or three 
met together for any purpose, even sound- 
ing a pond, his suspicion and disdain awoke; 
and on a number associated formally In reli- 
gion or politics or trade fell the full measure 
of his scorn. He could not endure that aver- 
aging up of conscience and judgment, tacit or 
expressed, which form human law and public 
opinion; nor could he even tolerate persons 
guided by the results thereof. 

May i8. Heavy shower, followed by 
fine warm weather. The sweet elusive scent 
of grape blossoms streaks the air, and one 
constantly turns one's head to discern whence 
It comes. Not everyone knows the pleasant 
acidulous taste of grape tendrils. 

May ig. We finish harrowing today, and 
the field is ready for marking. Stripped of 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 103 

her green mantle, prostrate and receptive, the 
earth lies bare and smooth before you, every 
curve and slope apparent, and the soil tints 
from yellow gravel to purple clay, showing 
as they never can do under crop, much less in 
frost or drought. Mid-May surrounds one 
with possibilities. 

May 20. Marking of corn. Riding on a 
sled whose runners, four feet apart, line out 
two rows at once on the soft surface of 
mould, I drive up and down a field more 
than a thousand feet long. A marking pole 
with scraper traces a faint line six feet to one 
side. Arrived at the end of the field, I haul 
the sled round, throw over the hinged mark- 
er, and drive back, keeping the tongue be- 
tween the horses, right over the scratch the 
scraper made on the last trip. The team 
seems to appreciate the change from the 
heavy plow and harrow to the light sled, and 
at times I urge them into a trot. 

May 21. S. Each form of life may be 
taken as the ultimate expression of its com- 
bination of qualities. Conditions, as it were, 
narrow about the advancing assembly of at- 
tributes, close before it, form a mold; and 
behold the utmost that can be done in that di- 
rection. Thus the mouse is the smallest crea- 
ture the conditions of sub-division of fluids 
and gases would permit to the qualities of a 
mammal; the elephant, the largest, gravita- 
tion and cohesion would allow the same at- 



104 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

tributes. The horse represents the highest 
harmonies in combination of size, strength 
and speed, the conditions of air, earth, diet 
and capacity for domestication will admit; 
man, the utmost physical development possi- 
ble to a biped possessed of intellect; and wo- 
man, the utmost of all these consistent with 
beauty. 

May 22. Planting corn. One man goes 
over the field dropping four or five kernels at 
the intersection of the four-foot marks, the 
other follows and covers with a hoe. Drop- 
ping corn is proverbially light work, which 
may be done by women and children, yet for 
many hours at a time it is tedious, if done 
with any rapidity. One must reach almost 
to the ground to keep the seed from landing 
out of place, especially if a shower has 
packed the bottom of the rows since morn- 
ing, and as rising and stooping again every 
four feet wastes time, the swift worker must 
go across the field elbows and knees in con- 
tact. The process is just the reverse of sow- 
ing. There the seed is whirled widely from 
the finger tips; here the fingers and thumb 
form a funnel, down which the seed slides, 
always tumbling inwards, so as to form a lit- 
tle pyramid, whence the stalks shall spring as 
closely together as possible. 

May 2j. Finished planting corn. Three 
rows along one side of the field, where it is 
bounded by a line of saplings and bushes, I 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 105 

prepared with Paris Green; first dropping 
the tarred corn at the intersections, and then 
dusting the poison over it. Crows have done 
great injury to our corn the last two seasons; 
and this is the place they are most likely to 
attack. Probably two hundred years ago the 
settlers looked at the Indians as we at crows. 

May 24. Went to Ortley. Great is the 
change from green and fertile fields to the 
barren sand bar forever battered by the sea's 
fists. The lupins are not out yet, but the 
broom is in bloom, covering the sand beneath 
it with gold-dust. Saw about fifty fish hawks 
at once. 

May 25. Crossed bay here about two and 
a half miles wide, in skill. There was a slight 
breeze blowing against me. It took one 
thousand oar strokes, and about three-quar- 
ters of an hour. 

May 26. Sailing with L. and Mr. J. in A. 
J.'s sharpie. Beat against a strong south 
wind, and we all got indifferent wet. The flat 
bottomed boat pounds the waves much more 
than a round bottomed one. 

May 27. They say a hundred years ago 
Barnegat Bay was a nest of pirates. Cer- 
tainly no piece of water could be better suited 
to these gentry. They might fall off to sea, 
plunder a coaster, and then escape up the tor- 
tuous channels of the bay, where a boat of 



io6 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

any size would ground, or, if hard pressed, 
into one of the many creeks flowing into it 
where concealment would be easy, and detec- 
tion almost impossible. 

May 28. S. There is an old question, 
"When an irresistible force meets an immov- 
able body, what will be the result?" The 
answer is, creation. "And the earth was 
without form and void; and darkness was 
upon the face of the deep; and the spirit of 
God moved upon the face of the waters." 
Does that not describe it? The meeting of 
force with quiescence has always creative re- 
sults. The blow of the hammer on the rock 
strikes fire; the meeting of male with female 
results In birth; the Impact of Divinity on 
Death issued in that new creation, Resurrec- 
tion. 

"1st er In Werdelust 
Schaftender Freude nah?" 

May 29. Returned from Ortley; found 
corn coming up nicely. The tightly rolled 
sprouts breaking the ground resemble the 
points of green nails driven from below. 
Sometimes they come through cleanly, some- 
times they lift a bit of the soil crust on one 
side or like a trap-door, now and then three 
or four shoots will lift a bit of earth entirely 
from its surroundings, like a miniature crom- 
lech. 

May JO. Surveyors appeared again this 
morning. Perhaps the fact that Washington 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 107 

began life as a surveyor to some extent en- 
courages their air of being instruments of the 
irresistible. They assure you it is impossible 
their own course be altered, and treat the 
rights of all others as jests or anachronisms. 
They hold with Selkirk : 

'Tm monarch of all I survey". 

May 5/. Cutting orchard grass (Dacty- 
lis glomerata) on lawns and roadside. Its 
tall thick branches make a great show, but do 
not make up such a burden as the less con- 
spicuous timothy. While velvet grass (Hol- 
cus lanatus) is much later, and much resem- 
bles it in form, but is colorless and worthless. 

June I. Got up before five and went 
down to replant corn. As I topped the hill 
the crows flew off, cawing angrily. "This is 
our time" they seemed to say. Found hill 
after hill scratched over and the sprouting 
corn scattered about. At five A. M. in June 
one has the weather of 9 A. M. in October, 
or high noon in December. How must the 
feet of those who walked over grass and 
plough in the dewy morn have "full of fen 
honged", as Langland says, before rubber 
boots were invented. The difference then 
was of course that hoed crops were confined 
to the garden. 

June 2. Hoeing potatoes. The crooked 
greenish white sprouts lie like maggots with 



io8 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

their mouth just opening along the rows, and 
we cut the weeds — sorrel, round-top, and 
convolvulus from between them with our 
hoes. In a way the *'Man With the Hoe" 
has a better time than the wielder of any oth- 
er tool. He fells nothing but what ought to 
be felled. 

June J. Finished replanting corn, about 
four hundred hills out of about twenty-two 
thousand. This is a much smaller propor- 
tion than for many years, and if the crows 
never did more harm than this we would not 
bother them. The three rows I poisoned 
with Paris Green have come up very badly. 
Evidently the arsenic was too much for the 
corn. 

June 4. S. Ariston men hud or. The hu- 
man race is water. Ormuzd is heat. Ahri- 
man is cold, humanity saved is steam, hu- 
manity depraved is ice. The lowest depth of 
the Inferno was the Giudecca. The "spirit 
chat denies" cannot originate or diversify, 
as can "fantastic summer's heat", can only 
reduce matter to its own likeness and level. 
"The Devil is an Egoist". All things are 
contracted by cold, one only except. Water 
expands when changing to ice, and in this ac- 
tion on humanity, somewhat resembling that 
of steam at the other end of the scale, lies 
the Enemy's power. 

June 5. Began cultivating corn. A horse 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 109 

drags a frame with five or six little plows on 
the under side between the rows of sprouting 
corn, while the man steers the affair with 
two handles like a wheelbarrow, at the same 
time guiding the cultivator with his right 
hand, handling the horses' reins with his left, 
and occasionally kicking off the clods or 
stones which fall on the corn-hills with one 
foot. Thus, like a modern organist, he 
plays on his "harp of a hundred strings", and 
adds his note to the farmer's chorus. 

June 6. Jethro Tull is said to have been 
the first to have introduced cultivation (or 
tillage) of grain. He thought this sufficed 
without manure; and perhaps it may have 
done so on his heavy clays. The laborers of 
his day, though they durst not refuse to use 
his new fangled tools, were bitterly opposed 
to them, and broke or lost them whenever 
they could. 

June 7. Cultivation on the three acre 
tears out great masses of roots — briar, eld- 
er, sassafras, locust — which roll up and pack 
under the cultivator until it will go no furth- 
er, and one must stop midway across the 
field, and carry the stuff away by armfuls. 
Occasionally a stouter root then usual, run- 
ning under a hill of corn, will tear it out with 
a square foot of earth before one can stop. 
After a time the horse learns in going to 
keep about a foot from the newly broken 
ground of the last space, and in returning to 



no A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

tread the slight furrow he has made. The 
chief difficulty is at the ends where he wants 
to swing out for the turn before he should. 
Correcting this tendency by the rein, and at 
the same time keeping the cultivator teeth in 
the ground, is hard on the left hand, which 
is usually much abraded by the time the first 
tending is over. 

June 8. Thinning beets. They are sin- 
gled out with hoe or trowel to stand about 
ten inches apart, which of course necessitates 
the destruction of many promising young 
plants. While thus engaged, I have often 
fancied a complaint arising from the rejected 
ones. "Why did you tear me out? I can 
understand why you should destroy small, 
stunted, or deformed specimens; but I and 
my friend yonder were as large and fine as 
any in the field." To which the reply, incom- 
prehensible to them, would be, "You did not 
grow in the right place." 

June g. Not only do the birds of the air 
levy toll upon the corn, but many hills are de- 
stroyed by moles, whose runs, like miniature 
tunnels which have suffered collapse, may be 
seen streaking the field in all directions when 
the first cultivation is long deferred. Pug- 
nacity is not usually counted among the 
moles' attributes, but I have seen a couple of 
them fight like bull dogs, tumbling about, 
squeaking, and not quitting their hold of each 
other's throats until they were lifted off the 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 1 1 1 

ground by a stick passed between them, and 
smartly shaken. 

June 10. As before stated, the old Mln- 
nislnk trail ran between our farms. Indians 
undoubtedly dwelt here in considerable num- 
bers, and corn tending is the best time to find 
their relics. This year's field does not yield 
much; the soil is heavy, the aspect northern. 
But on the sandy moraine of the larger farm, 
near the brook, we have found stone axes, 
pestles, clinkstone knives, and arrow-heads 
in abundance. That was the Indian's favorite 
location — a southern slope, a sandy soil 
where water would not stand, but near a run- 
ning stream. The cultivator brings all small 
objects to the surface, and when they have 
dried out they show distinctly. Point and 
edge — how hard they are to come by, how 
instructive when preserved. 

June II. S. On this day twenty-five 
years ago, seventy half bushel baskets of 
cherries were picked from the trees on our 
lawn. This year the entire crop will be less 
than half that amount. The same or worse 
is true of the Bartlett pears. In '92, we had 
three hundred baskets. Last year, not one. 

The "June drop" is a term primarily ap- 
plied to the falling of tree fruit which gen- 
erally, if not always takes place at that time 
of year. Especially is this the case with 
peaches, which, though they may have 
crowded the branches shortly after blossom- 



112 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

Ing, when the dried up flower can be drawn 
like a hat from the httle white woolly head, 
are always sadly thinned six weeks later. To 
a certain extent, this is natural and even de- 
sirable. Few trees could bring to maturity 
the number of fruits which "set" upon them, 
and they would seldom be of marketable size 
if it was done. The same remarks will ap- 
ply to apples. But though it is well that half 
the fruit should fall when as large as grapes. 
It Is not well that most or all should do so. 
Something like the above may be noticed 
with most plane trees, and a few oaks. Their 
leaves push early. In June comes a halt, the 
tender foliage withers, and the tree seems 
about to die. Then it takes a new start, 
sends out buds from a different part of the 
same branch, and by August the tree Is In 
dark and heavy leaf. 

June 12. Rain In moderate quantity. All 
through this spring, there has been just 
enough precipitation to keep things alive, 
like six-pence a day doled out to a pensioner. 
One of the phrases most constantly In the 
mouth of the said pensioner is "If I could 
only jlst git a little ahead", and so say the 
crops as they wilt and curl. 

June /J. Cut orchard grass. This was 
sown alone In spring two years ago. Last 
year It cut a very fair crop, two loads to the 
acre, which contained little orchard grass, 
however, but mostly a kind of meadow fes- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 113 

cue. This season it is a mixture of both. 
Orchard grass always increases where once it 
gets a footing, because, being one of the earl- 
iest to mature, its seeds fall before the other 
grasses are cut. 

And now the hay-cart passes among the 
mounds and reefs so plain to see since the bil- 
lows of grass went down, and pitcher and 
loader take their places. The first has, tradi- 
ditionally, the harder task, and is supposed 
to need great strength. But he must not be 
judged altogether by the rapidity of his 
work, so much depends on the material. Two 
good men, pitching long hay from the cock, 
have got on a load in nine minutes. Again, 
a fair worker, sending up dry short hay 
from the winrow, took an hour and three- 
quarters to make his load. He must also 
survey the cart occasionally from the rear, 
and judge if it is one-sided. But at last it is 
on, the gauntlet of tall fence post and low 
branch is run, and the tugging team stamps 
into the barn. The bright tined forks flash 
against the cavernous gloom as the mowers 
— short o — squeeze their way up the ladder. 
Whether mow and maw have the same root 
I am not sure, but the great empty space 
above the stock can be likened to no stom- 
ach save the constrictor's. Getting off the 
load is dull and dusty work, only relieved by 
that ancient jest "You must treat now!" 
when hay and fork together are jerked from 
the pitcher's hands, or by the joyous cry 
''There's the shelvings !" when the frame 



114 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

whereon the load Is built appears. 

June 14. Turtles peculiarly active at pres- 
ent. We have three varieties, the common 
solid shell, the box-turtle, and a small leath- 
ery species, with yellow dots instead of let- 
terings. It Is seldom that one sees them eat 
anything; but I remember finding one In the 
orchard, which, after standing aloof awhile, 
ate several raspberries from my fingers. 
Now and then one sees a specimen with a 
carapace like a crushed hat or old shoe, 
which has evidently been broken under a 
wheel and healed all out of shape. Would 
we break our bones oftener if we had them 
all on the outside? Thoreau says they eat 
cranberry and sorrel leaves. 

June IS' Got In two loads hay. All the 
large solid forkfuls are pitched up, and put 
around the front, back and sides of the load, 
and only the small wisps thrown in the mid- 
dle. A load of hay is made up very like a 
load of bags of grain, only the bunches are 
not so distinct. One feels the flight of time 
as one opens the big barn doors, lets the light 
into the dark corners, and sees the straws 
and chaff remaining of the crop that was 
pitched in a year ago. As the pitcher walks 
from cock to cock, he runs his fork before 
him, on the ground, gathering up a small 
bunch. 

June 16. Mending barb wire fence. There 
is nothing on the farm so convenient or so 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 115 

hateful as this. A line of it can be erected 
in a very short time, at small expense, and on 
very poor posts. For two or three years it is 
bearable. Then it deteriorates steadily till 
the end. And whereas the last remnants of 
the rail fence are good for fuel, old rusty 
barb wire is utterly worthless, and can only 
be got rid of by burying it. I have a scar of 
its making twenty years old. I knew a cow 
that was badly cut up by it, another who lost 
an eye by swinging her head around close to 
it. And once I found a flying squirrel hang- 
ing dead by a fold of his parachute. The 
wound was slight, but he could not escape, 
and must have hung there till he starved. 

June 77. Finished second cultivation of 
corn. Cut more grass and cocked it up. At 
this time of year snakes frequently ensconce 
themselves under the cocks, whether for 
warmth by night or coolness by day I do not 
know. 

June 18. S. On French coins, with their 
effigies of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity, 
it is worthy of note that the central figure of 
Equality is a head taller than the others; a 
result not infrequently aimed at by those who 
call for him. Oh, Equality, how many fol- 
lies are committed in thy name ! 

June ig. Very hot morning. In after- 
noon came up a cool, east wind, which rapid- 
ly and pleasantly lessened the temperature. 



ii6 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

We are about thirty miles from the ocean, 
but probably the salty odor comes rather 
from the great salt marshes of the Raritan. 
Salt water must have an extensive surface to 
evaporate on before its odor is distinct. 
There is little of it on a clean sand beach, 
still less in mid-ocean. 

June 20. Yesterday I rode into a neigh- 
bor's field just cleared of hay through open 
bars. I had never been on just that spot be- 
fore, though I have lived near it so long — 
and the effect of novelty was strange. The 
road, along which I have travelled thousands 
of times, did not look at all as I had sup- 
posed; indeed, but for the double line of 
fence, I should not have known it was there 
at all. Would not everything seem new all 
our lives if, at thirty-five, the landscape was 
turned as In a mirror? 

Of meadows after mowing, Herrick 
sings — 

''Like unthrlfts, having spent 
Your stock, and needy grown. 
You're left here to lament 
Your poor estate alone". 

Most likely Herrick never handled scythe 
or rake himself; yet he caught the feeling 
which possesses every farmer walking over 
the mowing lot a day or two after It Is 
cleared. A few hours ago, the field lying un- 
visited for three hundred and sixty days of 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 117 

the year, was a scene of tumultuous activity. 
Here you lived; here as much excitement 
mingled with your labor as farm work ever 
knows. Toiling to the utmost, hard and 
long, defying the heat and apprehending the 
shower, you were young again, if that you 
could stand and see. Here was the stone 
over which the mower bumped, and left a 
wisp standing; here was the gully into which 
your foot slipped while heaving up a forkful, 
making your bones crack. This bit was thin 
and short, as you can tell by the shreds the 
rake has left; that was a fair mix of clover 
and grass. Bowed and stiff, you wonder at 
the exertions you made on that day of battle, 
and wonder yet more if another year will 
find you renewing them on the same spot. 

June 21. Poisoned potatoes. Filling a 
watering pot from a cask in the lane, and 
stirring into it a spoonful of Paris Green, one 
walks up and down the rows as rapidly as 
possible, sprinkling the rows going and re- 
turning, twenty rows, six hundred feet long, 
each row to be covered twice, makes about 
five miles of walking to the acre, not to 
speak of carrying the water. It Is now about 
thirty years since the potato bug first ap- 
peared. I remember the consternation he 
caused — and how one neighbor thought he 
had hit on a fine plan for the discomfiture of 
the intruder, namely, to set his children to 
brushing the insects off the vines with brooms 
and then quickly following with a plow, bury- 



ii8 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

Ing them deeply. But next day they had all 
come out again. The onion maggots are very 
bad in R's field this season, quarrying out the 
center of the shoot, and also that of the 
young cauliflower plants. Maggots, potato 
bugs, turnip flies, cabbage worms, gypsy 
moths, San Jose scale — does it not seem as if 
the nameless parasites which tormented hu- 
manity for so many milleniums had now fall- 
en on vegetable life? 

June 22. Heavy shower this afternoon, 
big ailanthus tree on Dennis Street blown 
down. Have hitched my horse to it these 
thirty-years. It was perhaps five feet in cir- 
cumference at the ground, though rapidly 
diminishing, and only a thin strip of green 
wood and bark, going one third around the 
base, and not thicker than one's hand, had 
kept the life in it of late. The butt projected 
on all sides over the surrounding flag stones, 
as if the tree had run down upon them like 
a melting candle. The heart was badly de- 
cayed, and probably it would have fallen 
long ago, but for being upright and well bal- 
anced. 

June 2j. Began working corn with Riggs' 
plow. This is a two horse implement, and in 
using it one horse goes on each side of the 
row of corn, as do three of the six small 
plows set in the frame, turning a slight fur- 
row inward. As the driver would find it im- 
possible to avoid stepping on the corn if he 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 119 

came directly after, the handles are slanted 
well over to the left enabling him to walk in 
that space. Great care is required, in bring- 
ing the horses about at the end of the row, to 
make the eight heavy trampling feet pass 
among the tender hills of corn without crush- 
ing them down, and at the same time heave 
the cumbrous plough around. Burns would 
not have written "Corn Riggs are bonnie" 
of this sort of thing. 

June 24. Light rain again. Just enough 
to spoil hay, but not to help grass. The 
small funnels of growing maize, however, 
take it all in gratefully. It rather bothers 
one in hoeing to see bits of mud or small 
stones caught in said funnels. Apparently 
they can never get out but by working down 
and wearing a hole through the side of the 
stalk. In muddy weather, the edge of the 
hoe is soon covered with a mass of fibrous 
roots, which necessitates banging it on a 
stone every few yards. This intermittent 
clang harmonizes well with the cracking 
voices of the crows, who flap swiftly across 
the field, aware that the corn is now too large 
for them to pull up. 

June 25. S. When a child I thought that 
clouds were all formed of chimney smoke, 
and wondered how there could be any in un- 
inhabited places. 

June 26, Continued working corn. Shook 



I20 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

out last week's grass, partly by hand, partly 
with the tedder. Doubtless the inventor of 
this machine had watched the backward 
stroke of a fork in the hands of a man toss- 
ing grass. The motion is almost exactly the 
same. On the other hand, few processes 
could be more unlike than the curving stroke 
of the long scythe-blade, and the working of 
a mower knife, which is but a great saw laid 
flat on the ground and dragged slowly for- 
ward with a short stroke. 

June 2J. Wamba, in a familiar passage 
of "Ivanhoe", explained that the live brute 
was for the Saxon to feed, but dressed meat 
for the Norman to eat, by rehearsing their 
respective names, as "ox", "beef", "swine", 
"pork", etc., etc. How is it with harness? 
Collar, traces, reins, hames, terets, saddle, 
Latin; bit, girth, throat-lash, Saxon; crupper, 
martingale, French. The drawing, govern- 
ing, and ornamental portions would seem to 
come chiefly from the South. 

June 28. Still haying. The crop is short 
this year in this neighborhood, only about 
two-thirds of what might have been expected 
from the acreage. Cool and dry weather the 
cause. I observe that while the wheat where 
I sprinkled the fertilizer in April looks bet- 
ter than it promised at one time, the young 
clover sown thereon is utterly dead. 

June 2g. Finished third cultivation of 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 121 

corn yesterday. A good many clumps of 
sod are dragged to the top, and disfigure the 
face of the field. Two more loads of hay. 
It is short and dry, and gusts of wind scat- 
ter it about the field in loading. 

June JO. This has been a dry and windy 
month. Winter's snows were heavy, but they 
melted and ran off before the earth was 
thawed enough to soak them in. Since then 
there have been frequent light showers, but 
no long heavy rains, and the subsoil is very 
dry. Nothing remains as a reserve to fall 
back upon, if a real drought should come on. 

July I. V. finished fourth cultivation of 
corn, by working late. The field is now in 
good clean condition, well broken up, but not 
crumbling as heat and moisture would make 
it do. None of the showers have been able 
to soak through a bit of upturned sod. The 
corn is about eighteen to twenty inches high, 
growing pretty well, but blue with drought. 

July 2. S. Shower in morning, produc- 
ing a rainbow in the west, a rather infrequent 
sight. Once in my life I have seen a lunar 
rainbow. This is of necessity very rare, de- 
pending on the coincidence of a heavy show- 
er about 8 p. m. with the rising full moon. It 
had the rainbow bands, in darker light, but 
no color — which I take to be the distinguish- 
ing mark of a ghost. 



2 22 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

July J. To thoroughly know one's farm, 
one should not only till the soil, and climb 
its trees, but descend into its depths, he 
should be something of the miner as well as 
farmer. The dwellers of Kentucky and Vir- 
ginia, where caves are frequent, have here 
an advantage, as have the Italians, on their 
porous volcanic rocks. 

July 4. Andrew Fairservice observed that 
if there was one fair day of the seven, the 
Sabbath was sure to lick it up. This will ap- 
ply to the holidays which are becoming so 
frequent, among us, and especially to the 
Fourth of July. V. and I, being old and in- 
different to sport, got in two loads of hay 
anticipating the shower which almost invar- 
iably comes on the evening of Independence 
Day; but a young fellow would have thought 
it hard. 

July 5. Got two loads hay. This year it 
is hard and short, containing little clover and 
little color. They say that in a dry year the 
grass is "half grain," and much more nutri- 
tious than in a wet season. This seems rea- 
sonable, and is certainly consolatory. 

July 6. Cut grass. McG. came and 
reaped our wheat with his selfbinder. The 
machine comes turned edgeways, so that it 
will go through gateways. Then he turns it 
sideways, let it down, puts one of our horses 
between his two, and reaps down the field at 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 123 

the rate of an acre per hour. When we came 
to this farm a quarter of a century ago, self- 
binders were unknown and cradles still in 
use. I once cradled an acre and a quarter of 
wheat in a day, and bound some of it besides. 
Of course, a really good cradler could do 
much better. Mr. G's machine slips a band 
occasionally, and an old fashioned band must 
be substituted. Take a handful of straw, 
hold it before you, heads up, twist half of it 
between your left wrist and the other half, 
bring it round and over, hold the two with 
your left forefinger, bring the huts together 
round the sheaf, twist and tuck in. All this 
care is necessary to prevent the heads on the 
band from shelling. 

July 7. Two loads hay. The barn is fill- 
ing up, and we have to pitch to the scaffold, 
and then to the top of the mow. Showers 
threatened, but did not reach us. Corn now 
two to three feet high, begins to curl in the 
afternoon, like a fore and aft vessel close 
hauled in the wind. 

July 8. Carted in wheat In afternoon. 
Three loads, seven hundred and seventy 
sheaves. A load of sheaf grain Is curiously 
small, square, and solid, like a big strawen 
hamper of corn. Several showers passed by 
to the south as we drew It In. Their sharp 
white edges just avoiding us, and we could 
see and hear the streams of rain roaring 
down from them on the wood bevond the 



124 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

pond — but we only got a few drops. 

The amount of grain In sheaf that can be 
got into a small barn is surprising. It is said 
that a skilled worker can stow one third 
more wheat in a given space than a careless 
or unheeding hand. When flung in anyhow, 
frequently crossing each other, or even 
standing on end, the bundles will settle little 
more than logs of wood, except by the burst- 
ing of their bands; but laid on regular, even 
courses, each time reversing top and butt, 
they will pack down as much as their nature 
will admit, forming a solid, yet not ill venti- 
lated mass. When at length a bent, (the 
space up in the roof between two rafter-girts, 
generally about ten feet wide) has been filled 
with the forks, until, apparently, it will hold 
no more, a man who "takes an interest" will 
climb into the peak, and, bracing his back 
against the rafters, crowd the grain yet a lit- 
tle further down, and pass in sheaf after 
sheaf by hand, until at last he has disposed 
of sixty or seventy bundles where there 
seemed not room for one. Had Hamlet wit- 
nessed such a scene? And was this his mean- 
ing when he said "They fool me to the top of 
my bent?" 

July g. S. Quite hot, almost the first op- 
pressive day we have had. What an exam- 
ple of the golden mean is the human body, 
keeping to its 98° Fahrenheit, through heat 
and cold "aequa in arduls" for sixty years or 
more. It suffers from both but will not yield. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 125 

Its very sufferings prove its constancy. Did 
it take the temperature like a drop of lead it 
were not pinched. 

Shakespeare troubled himself little with 
climate; but so far as he had any, it was all 
English. The frequent precipitation, the 
grass and mire alternating, the thick green 
woods, the lovely springs, the summer days 
marked rather by length than heat, the win- 
ter ones, more damp than cold, the plente- 
ous springs and rivers — such was the weath- 
er to him, whether his characters moved In 
Britain, or Austria, Venice or Navarre, Den- 
mark, Athens, Sicily, or Prospero's Isle. He 
will throw in a line or two becoming the 
place, perhaps, as the "nipping and eager 
air" in Hamlet; but he soon reverts to the 
willow'd pool where Ophelia makes her end, 
and the clay of an English church-yard. 
Snakes and Jack-o-lanterns annoy his wan- 
derers in moony woods, but not gnats and 
mosquitoes; floods and storms afflict his peas- 
antry, but not droughts. The Navarresse 
ambassadors masquerade in Russian furs 
with no apparent discomfort; and once only 
does he mention a sledge, as knowing that 
but one such article existed In Britain. Sum- 
mer's heat Is to him fantastic, not imminent 
and terrible. Winter's cold may freeze the 
milk in pail and pinch the shepherd's fingers, 
but slays no man in the drifts. 

July 10. Still at the haying. There al- 
ways seems a certain impropriety in making 



126 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

hay after wheat harvest. I found a locus*- 
shrilHng on one of the bean-poles. He con- 
tinued the sound while I stood by and 
watched him. He first set himself firmly, 
like a man about to raise a weight, gripping 
the pole with his feet and slightly spreading 
his wings, so as to keep them away from the 
body. Then expanding his abdomen so that 
the rings were visible, like the scales in a 
fish's body, when you bend it, he sent forth 
his note, at first softly, while the eye could 
follow his abdomen's dilation and contrac- 
tion, until the scream was at its utmost, and 
vision was too slow for the quivering rings. 
Then it diminished, and ceased suddenly just 
as the eye could catch the motion again. Five 
times he repeated this while I stood by. It 
was as though wind were forced through a 
Venetian blind rapidly opened and closed. 

July II. Another warm day. Saw two 
roosters, whom we will call A. and B. fight- 
ing. They had got to the point where both 
were weary and A. could only trot closely 
after B. occasionally overtaking and pecking 
him. On one of these runs, B., the pursued, 
was describing a large circle, while A. took 
a smaller one, which, their pace being almost 
alike, brought him of course, first abreast, 
and then ahead of B. Without indication, 
perhaps without consciousness, that their po- 
sitions were changed, they kept on their way, 
and A. but now victorious, was presently 
overtaken, pecked, and jumped upon by B. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 127 

One load hay. Light showers prevented 
more, but, slightly revived the drooping 
corn. 

July 12. The brief moisture soon dried 
away, and we cut the last grass, and got in 
three loads of hay. Yesterday our older 
brood of chicks, eight in number, and about 
half grown, were wandering about the barn 
as usual, when they suddenly screamed, and 
three of them appeared running as in fright. 
We thought it was but a passing scare from 
a hawk or dog, and that the rest would pres- 
ently appear, but they have been seen no 
more. They have been bagged either by 
man or beast, probably the former, as no re- 
mains can be found. 

July 75. Got in three loads of hay, the 
last of the crop. Total twenty-six. Our 
stock will devour almost all of this by next 
haying perhaps a load or two may be sold. 
As none of the loads were large, there might 
be about twenty tons in all. The whole has 
been sent aloft by human sinews. About sev- 
enty-five pitches would go to putting a load 
on, as many more to mowing it, say four 
thousand total. So many heaves of human 
dorsal and triceps muscle lie embodied there, 
dried, salted, and stowed away for equine 
mouths to chew and swallow. 

July 14. Yesterday Charles T. whom I 
have not seen since he emigrated to Nebras- 



128 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

ka in 1877, nearly thirty years ago, came 
down to see me in the field. As he drew 
near, I saw his G. A. R. badge (he was in the 
ist N. J. Cavalry) and wondered how I had 
brought myself within reach of the law, at 
first mistaking him for a policeman. He is 
some twelve years older than I, but better 
preserved. He first taught me the four 
things required of a farm-hand, to plough, 
sow, mow and milk; just as an able seaman 
in ye olden time, must hand, reef, steer and 
heave the lead. He spoke of going to see a 
friend he had known in youth. "I went to 
her place", said he, "but I found I was two 
years too late". He seems to have done 
well in Nebraska, despite the droughts, 
which by his account, are terrible. 

July 75. Drove out on Centerbush road, 
and returning counted the rum holes on the 
north side of Gaull Street alone. There 
were eleven of them in about a mile. What- 
ever the hardships of the Middle Ages, they 
had one great advantage; distilled liquor 
was practically unattainable. It is only 
about two hundred years ago (see Hogarth) 
that Beer Street became Gin Lane. 

We find, in all pleasure, one little drop of 
bitter. And is not that what keeps them 
pleasures? The bee, it is said, stings each 
cell once, to preserve the honey. The good 
time when everything went on wheels — when 
we did not get wet, or hungry, or bruised, 
when nothing failed and nothing broke — is 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 129 

not the good time we remember. The load 
of hay you only just got in, between sun- 
stroke and shower, the jump your horse 
made across the brook, when you barely kept 
your seat, the pull through the breakers in 
the swamping boat, these are the things you 
recollect with satisfaction. "Forsitan haec 
olim meminisse juvabit". Polycrates under- 
stood this when he tried to supply the needed 
drop himself, by letting fall his ring in the 
sea. Damocles, if he survived, probably 
took more pleasure in reverting to the ban- 
quet of the dangling sword than to any other 
he had shared with Dionysius, and the cap- 
tain's boy, who leaped from truck to sea, 
under compulsion, at Port Mahon, must 
have kept that day among his brightest mem- 
ories. 

July 16. S. Sitting down in the lane and 
leaning my back against a big beech tree, I 
was surprised at its coolness, ceaseless and 
refreshing, while stones large and small, are 
heated through and through. But of course 
this is the life of the tree, holding its normal 
temperature of 50° or so, conspicuous when 
that of the air is 90° or more, and noticeable 
in the beech beyond any other, because of its 
smooth bark. Slumber came readily there. 

How terrible our necessity for sleep 
would appear to any one, a denizen of an- 
other planet, for instance, who belonged to 
an order of beings capable of rest without 
loss of consciousness. "Of course, we all He 



I30 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

down at times", he might admit, "but that is 
the season for study, conversation, mind- 
play, and is it possible that your minds, need 
rest as well as your bodies? Methinks that 
militates strongly against the idea of im- 
mortality, and makes your souls seem no 
more than the odors of plants, or even their 
shadows. Oh, you breathe while you slip- 
slop — ah, pardon me, sleep, but you cannot 
eat? that seems strange. Then if you slept 
too long you would starve. Hunger wakes 
you ? Then it is more a matter of body than 
mind. Can't you ever think of anything 
while you are in this deplorable condition? 
Oh, you have; and you call them drams? I 
have seen in an old book on chemistry that 
three scruples — am I wrong — make a dram. 
Oh, a dram is a little drink? And your free 
thoughts are dreams. And you have no 
scruples in them? Utterly without con- 
science? Pardon me again, I am always 
wrong". 

July ly. A brood of eight chicks off 
on Saturday, another of ten today. These 
are stolen nests, and this hot weather favors 
the young, who dart about from the first, 
bright-eyed and alert, unlike the chilled and 
lagging broods of April and May. Not long 
ago a hen brought off a brood in the cow 
barn. I saw them up there before breakfast; 
after breakfast they were all down on the 
ground. The only way was through a scut- 
tle, with a drop of seven feet to the floor, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 131 

and how she persuaded them to take the leap 
I do not know. 

Wings grow faster than the tail, 
Then your chick is hke to fail; 
Tail grows faster than the wing, 
Then your chick will dance and sing. 

July 18. Hottest day of the season. Ther- 
mometer 100° in shade, probably 20° or 
30° more in the sun. One darts from one 
patch of shade to another, like one in pres- 
ence of archers, who durst not peep beyond 
his shield. The fowls go about holding their 
wings away from their bodies. The horses 
sweat in the stable. The cellar steps drip, 
the corn, which early in the morning spread 
its blades wide and green, seems by noon to 
have shrunk to half the size folding its 
leaves like the sensitive plant. It looks as 
if the crop was done for. It cannot stand 
many such days. 

The worm, like many a nobler form of 
life, loves equality of temperature and mois- 
ture. In winter he goes deep into the soil, 
too deep to be reached by ordinary digging; 
and if an excavation brings him to the sur- 
face, he freezes stiff before he can get down 
again. In April, May, and June he is within 
reach of spade or plough; after July he is 
not often seen unless an extraordinary wet 
spell drowns him out. Darwin has said much 
of the good work he does in renovation of 
the soil, and has calculated the number of 



132 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

cartloads per acre brought to the surface by 
wormcasts ; which reminds me that it is years 
since I saw a worm-cast, though I used to do 
so frequently when a boy. Even if children's 
eyes are not better (they generally are) they 
are so much closer to the earth that they no- 
tice many things on it which their adults do 
not. The worm's one shift, when drawn 
from his hole by the ruthless robin or black- 
bird, is contortion. He seems sure that if he 
could but tie a large knot in himself (and he 
can do it, too, give him time enough) the 
bird couldn't, or wouldn't, swallow him. Per- 
haps this is true. 

July ig. Another fiercely hot day, though 
not quite so intense as yesterday. Mr. G. 
came with an old-fashioned reaper, and cut 
our oats on Farfield. This leaves them in 
gavels (unbound sheaves) all over the field. 
Gefaal, according to Stormouth is Welsh for 
handful. Gavel-kind, one bunch per child. 
In the afternoon a strong wind somewhat 
ameliorated the heat, and we got in one load. 

Walked down this afternoon through cow 
pasture, which lies low, and is partially 
swampy. Last time I came this way it was 
on horseback, in May, and the animal fre- 
quently sank deep in black clay, sending wat- 
er squirting from under his feet. Now there 
is no trace of water, and the soil is either 
brick or brick-dust, saving its color. The 
dark earth has grown white with drought, 
and resembles a cracked and dirty china 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 133 

plate. The bushes have mostly been de- 
voured by the cattle, failing grass; but at one 
or two places, where they have grown thicker 
and faster than they could be torn down, the 
dark clumps of foliage, impenetrable by the 
sun, are lighted beneath by reflection from 
the chalky soil. No sassafras leaf is left, 
and no beech leaf would be left if any grew 
here; both possess peculiar sweetness. Wire 
weed gives an appearnce of verdure to much 
of the open field, almost as specious as if it 
were covered with gauze wire netting. Even 
the little ditch at one side is dry and hard 
and white, like a mammoth rut in a dusty 
road. The fence posts are gnawed closely 
around, as by a square tool. 

July 20. Cloudy and cooler. Drew in 
three loads oats, with V. and L. The gavels 
are handled with so called barley forks, 
made entirely of wood, with three tines 
about two feet long, and a curved wooden 
spring above them, so that the oats are held 
down and kept from scattering. One on each 
side pitches to the man on the load, going 
around the field and taking six rows at a 
time. As the oats lie with their heads all one 
way, and as said heads must all go inward, 
some dexterity is required. The man on the 
side where the heads are away from the wag- 
on has only to turn his fork half over to 
place them "deliverly" as Chaucer says, but 
the other must either turn about with each 
gavel, or get close to the wagon, and then 



134 A FARMER^S NOTE BOOK 

send the bunch backwards and sideways over 
his head. 

July 21. Much cooler. Got in four loads 
oats, which cleared the field. Undoubtedly 
a good crop. I think it is two hundred bush- 
els. V. says three, but the lesser amount is 
good for this brick-bat of a field, as it looked 
in March. Clay for oats, loam for grass, 
sand for corn. We have been a good deal 
bothered by the dewberry vines, sometimes 
ten or twelve feet long, which trip the fork 
as we lift them. There are also not a few 
docks, now seeding, and showing rusty on 
the yellow field. Otherwise, the crop is pret- 
ty clean. 

July 22. Hoed away roots. There is a 
sparrow's nest by the row of carrots, and 
every time I draw near the young lift up 
their heavy heads and large mouths. Why 
are the chicks of the domestic fowl so downy 
and pretty, and those of the wild birds so 
naked and hideous? Among beasts beauty 
goes with legs. Those with long limbs, as the 
horse, the deer, the giraffe, are graceful; 
those with short, stumpy ones, as the hippo- 
potamus and the toad, are ugly and awk- 
ward, while the snake, which has none at all, 
is an object of horror. 

The caterpillar is elevated some steps in 
the social scale above the worm, by the fact 
of his wearing clothes and shoes; and proba- 
bly he makes much of these distinctions and 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 135 

looks down on his grovelling relative, who 
has less to carry. There is much variety in 
their coats. I remember (again to recur to 
childhood's hours) lemon color, black, 
brown, either of these last two belted with 
the other, and pure white with a yellow tuft. 
This last, however, was of a feeble constitu- 
tion, unequal to the strenuous task of racing, 
which was our chief use for them. Urged on 
by a straw or bristle, they would develop re- 
markable speed, but it was difficult to make 
them run straight, while if goaded overmuch, 
they would "quit" like donkeys and roll 
themselves into balls. Many persons can 
still remember the inch, or measuring worms, 
of the fifties, and the ailantus tree, introduced 
from China as proof against their voracity. 
Touching these worms, a story is told of a 
popular preacher of those days, who had a 
son, 'T', said the old gentleman, "am like 
the inch-worm. I lift my head, I set 
It here and there. At last, when sure 
of my ground, I move along. But 
my son is like the grasshopper. Up he goes, 
and no one can tell where he will come down 
again". 

July 2j. S. A fine rain through the night 
and early morning, coming most opportunely 
to revive the corn, now the oats are stowed. 
In the afternoon I walked over Longfield. 
The maize has spread forth Its banners, and 
almost hides the earth. The blades, no long- 
er blue and slimy, are dark green, bristling 



136 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

with papillae, like a cat's tongue. Yet here 
and there is a stalk with a dead tassel-shoot 
baked by the sun, and here a dry spot of soil, 
under a sod or stone. The rain was only 
just in time to save the crop from utter ex- 
tinction. 

Well do I remember the place where the 
roller overtook me. I had been traversing 
the field with that conveyance, the hour of six 
sounded, and I drove toward the bars. Un- 
luckily, I had put the short reins on the team, 
which necessitated my walking beside the off 
horse, instead of going behind. I got a little 
too close, the frame struck my hip, knocking 
me over, and next moment the big half-ton 
log was crushing my legs into the earth. Like 
Chaucer's carter, "Under the whele ful low 
I lay adowne". Though my voice seemed 
suddenly summoned to my nether man, I 
yelled "WHOA!" as loudly as possible. This 
order it was well for me the horses did not 
instantly obey. The reins were dragged 
from my hands, the roller passed off me 
somewhere above the knees, and then came 
to a stop, as the team halted. Lying slanted 
outward, my body had escaped. I rose, feel- 
ing as if I had just suffered a severe attack of 
foot-binding, looked at the deep mark re- 
maining in the soft earth, if perchance aught 
of me yet lay there, scrambled on the roller, 
and was trundled up to the house. The 
crushing was painful, but not serious, and in 
two days I was afield again. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 137 

July 24. Walked yesterday to Mr. N.'s 
walnut field. It has woods on two sides, a 
deep ditch on a third, a thick hedgerow on 
the fourth. It bears a fine crop of fodder 
corn on one side, on the other flourishing 
mangels and potatoes. To eastward, the 
mansion across half a mile of smooth lawn- 
like meadow suggests an English estate, but 
the walnut field itself a pioneer's clearing. 

George Meredith has written a poem on 
the echo of the woodman's axe, which might 
have been, but was not, entitled "Hew and 
Cry". The classic conception of the mock- 
ing nymph, who wasted away until nothing 
was left but bones and a voice, is ingenious, 
if not as pretty as some; but did the Greeks 
never hear echoes in their great empty tem- 
ples? Or did they never speak loudly 
enough there to rouse them? Even a small 
room will give that miniature echo we call 
a "ring", and perhaps, if such a sound was 
ever produced, it was taken for the voice of 
offended deity. A close growth of wood- 
land will give back the sound almost as well 
as a rock, and so, in a less degree, will clouds, 
and even, if I mistake not, a strong up-rush- 
ing flame. Whether there is such a thing as 
a perpendicular echo only aviators are likely 
to be in position to judge. But setting this 
aside, evidently, as a rule, the valley-man 
alone can get the echo; the more lowly you 
work, the more it comes back to and tells 
upon you ; only the man on the height can be 
sure that he is a centre of outfluence. 



138 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

July 25. Hoed beets, where the couch 
grass, negligible during the drought, is 
springing up with wondrous vigor. The un- 
derground stems of this grass are exceed- 
ingly keen at the tips, almost able to pierce 
one's finger, quite able to grow through a 
beet or potato which happens to lie in the 
way. 

Everything nowadays must have a wrap- 
per. The sugar, flour, etc., which we used to 
buy in bulk, and take away packed in a cone 
of paper. Is now sold in bags of sizes to suit 
all tastes; the soap, which used to lie in great 
yellow bars without a thought of improprie- 
ty, is now done up in neat checked suits ; the 
honey sometime exposed in a milk-pan to the 
view of all, is pent In walls of glass, as well 
as the molasses, which once abode sulkily in 
Its hogshead; the raisins, the oranges, the 
pepper, all these naked little savages were 
dressed. And to ascend higher, Is not every 
book now sent forth with a neat paper coat, 
containing a wealth of information on all 
subjects and some others? And is it not 
thought necessary for every person who 
takes a bath to have a bath-robe to wear on 
the way. Instead of going to the bath-room, 
as of old, in one's clothes? If there was one 
thing which might have been expected to go 
bare to the end of time, it was a brick. 
Rough, cheap, intended to stand weather 
and change, wherefore should it be clad? 
Yet on this very day I met a teamster driving 
a cart loaded with what I presently saw to 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 139 

be bricks, each In a neat paper wrapper, like 
laundry soap. 

July 26. Snakes have been very scarce 
this year, have only seen two or three before 
today. On this place we have only three va- 
rieties — the striped or garter snake, the 
black snake, and the puff adder. This last is 
the only venomous variety, though I hardly 
suppose its bite would be fatal. It is check- 
ered in light and dark brown squares, and 
puffs itself out with air when alarmed — 
hence its name. Shakespeare well distin- 
guishes between the harmless snakes, solid 
colored or striped, and the noxious ones, 
checked or barred, in warning off 

"Ye spotted snakes with double tongue", 

from his fairy queen. 

Snakes are frequently depicted as coiling 
round a tree or branch, but the only time I 
ever saw one in a tree he was carefully bal- 
ancing himself on the upper side of a limb, 
availing himself of every twig and projection 
of the bark, but making no attempt to coil. 

July z'j. R. dug his Irish cobbler pota- 
toes. They are very early but not a heavy 
yield. His plan is to turn them out with a 
digger, and then go over the ground pulling 
them out of the loose earth with small short- 
handled, wooden toothed rakes. 

This, to a considerable extent avoids cut- 



140 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

ting and bruising them as, I have stated 
above, a hoe or fork will generally do. Al- 
most every kind of fruit or vegetable is read- 
ily broken or contused, and must be handled 
with care. Mrs. Moodie, an early emigrant 
to Canada, tells how a friendly Indian once 
brought her a present of wild grapes in a 
sack made of his shirt, tied at neck and 
wrists. When she hesitated to partake, he 
said that he would have taken his coat, but 
feared the weight would crush them, and, 
turning to the children, confidently observed 
"Papoose no care for dirty shirt". I have 
known a carpet-bag, filled with currants, to 
be dripping freely ere its journey ended — 
and I also remember once, taking some 
crates of blackberries to town in the heavy 
wagon, the spring cart being in some way 
disabled. The road was rough, the horses 
were slow, but did not for that avoid the 
stones. The berries reached market beauti- 
fully crimson of hue, instead of black; and 
finding no favor in the eyes of tasteless deal- 
ers, had to be disposed of at an alarming 
sacrifice, for instant use. 

July 28, Finished hoeing beets. They 
stand in the row like peg tops, five-sixths of 
them above ground. And the peg is very lia- 
ble to break. Between each row of beets lies 
a line of couch grass, beaten but unsubdued, 
like the Russians at Kunersdorf. 

Ours are sugar beets. The mangel-wurzel 
(root of need) a later, redder, and taller va- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 141 

riety, stand still more out of the ground and 
will produce a greater bulk and weight to 
the acre than anything that grows, except 
timber. And indeed a well-grown patch of 
mangel-wurzels greatly resembles one of 
those forests Dore was so fond of depicting 
for the poems of Dante and Tennyson. The 
resemblance is made more complete by lying 
on the ground and looking up at them, when 
the great gnarled trunks, occupying more 
space than the air between them, the rough 
bare ground beneath, and the short prospect 
for vision or missile call vividly up those 
woods through which Geraint bore Enid, or 
from which Bertrand de Born issued bear- 
ing his head. True, dense foliage above is 
wanting, but though Dore gives the resultant 
darkness below, he seldom elaborates leaf- 
age, confining himself mostly to the stem. 
Of his sylvan sketches it may be said with 
fullest truth, "You cannot see the wood for 
the trees". 

July 2g. Went around the place, putting 
up signs against trespassing with dog and 
gun. The gunning season begins November 
loth, and notices must be put up three 
months beforehand, there must be at least 
three of them on each property, and they 
must be more than three feet from the 
ground. If the requirements are not legal, 
they are at any rate firmly rooted in the opin- 
ions of gunners, who, when every particular 
has been complied with, will pay such regard 



142 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

to the notices as happens to suit their own 
convenience. 

July ^0. S. Discovered that a cornerstone 
at one angle of Longfield (ancient landmark) 
had been pounded to pieces with boulders by 
some idler. It was of grey slate, about six 
inches square by two feet high, and had been 
broken off level with the ground, and then 
splintered up. This is a peculiarly wanton 
piece of mischief, as it could in no way ad- 
vantage the perpetrator. "Qui a terre, a 
guerre". 

Who has not seen a coat, towel, or other 
like article, thrown carelessly on a chair fall 
into some resemblance to the human face or 
figure? I recall a picnic party, many years 
ago, when the soiled dishes were piled in a 
long heap on the table, and covered with 
the cloth. Coming that way later, I was 
struck by the likeness of the heap's outline to 
a veiled and prostrate female. Though strik- 
ing, the incident would soon have been for- 
gotten but for the sudden death of the 
youngest girl of our party, a little later. 

Knots, embers, and icicles are fertile in 
these likenesses, and so, as Hamlet observed, 
are clouds. A big boulder guarding a fence 
corner nearby here has an indication of the 
human countenance not greatly inferior to 
that of the Sphinx. Have seen three or four 
leaves, trampled together by a cow, bear a 
semblance to a fat German, booted and 
bearded, playing a mandolin. The sawed off 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 143 

stub of a broken tree has suggested Silenus. 
The shadows, or rather stains left on apples 
and pears by adhering leaves will go still 
further and indeed have been availed of hy 
the grower to furnish inscriptions and de- 
vices; but here we get beyond the lines of 
accident. 

July J/. Oats are specially liable to heat 
in the mow, so today I examined those housed 
ten days ago. A sweet steamy odor rises 
from them, as is natural, but nothing exces- 
sive. The "sweating" process takes from 
two to three weeks, somewhat resembling in- 
cubation, both in its duration, and in the cir- 
cumstance that eggs must hatch or spoil. On 
the only occasion when we had our oats cut 
with a self-binder they heated unmistakably. 
The scorching odor could be perceived to 
leeward of the barn, and each sheaf was so 
hot that the hand could hardly be thrust into 
it. Conflagration was averted by pulling the 
central bunch from each sheaf; but about 
a quarter of the crop was spoiled. Since 
then we have always had our oats cut on the 
loose gavel plan. 

August I. Several heavy showers have 
kept the corn going, and it is now tasselling 
out. It is fairly good on part of the three 
acre, and on the hither end, where cabbages 
were set five years ago. Some of the stalks 
at these places are flattened like the leg-bone 
of a horse, which always indicates vigorous 



144 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

growth. But a large portion midway down 
the field is small and poor. Observing that 
one hill had fallen, I went to ascertain the 
cause, and found that the inmates of an ant- 
hill near by, probably taking advantage of 
some wound inflicted on the young plant by 
the cultivator, had hollowed out the stalks 
to get at the sweet pith, until the corn fell by 
its own weight. 

August 2, Carting manure, which has 
been accumulating during the busy season, 
down to field number three on Cherry Lawn 
for next year's potatoes. K. despatched a 
chicken-killing dog in his hen-house a few 
nights ago. He graphically described how 
he rushed down without stopping to dress, 
and shot the dog, surrounded by the bodies 
of his victims, through a wire netting. 

"Air", one has said, "is like a rope; you 
can pull it, but you can't push it". In view 
of the possibilities of compressed air, as 
shown in the pop-gun and other lethal weap- 
ons, this statement might be questioned. At 
any rate, it is certain that air can be pushed 
from the human lungs shaped into missiles 
which pelt and hurt the bestial ear, and cause 
the owners of said ears to go wither we 
would. But how different are the missiles ! 
"Git", to horses, "Whey" to cows, "Get 
out", to dogs, "Scat", to cats, "Shoo", to 
fowls. The natives of India, when driving 
elephants, shout "Dak! dak I" a cry which 
seems very effective, not only with elephants, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 145 

but all domestic animals, as I have frequently 
proved. Perhaps It conveys to them some 
grievous alarm, some ancient malediction, 
which leaves them no Idea but of escape. It 
Is much easier to -drive a herd or flock than 
a single beast. Gregarlousness keeps them 
together, numbers make your target larger 
and more readily hit. Though at first sight It 
might not appear, it Is certain that intracta- 
bility on the part of the urged assists the urg- 
er. For as, to go back to the analogy we set 
out with, a rope is more easily led than driv- 
en, iron nails are more easily driven than 
lead. 

When one would capture animals, Instead 
of driving them — attract rather than repel — 
their most ancient designation is had re- 
course to, by way, as It were, of flattering 
their racial pride. Thus, horses are called 
"cope", suggesting the Greek "hippos", cows 
"cush", "co-bos" or "sukee", going back to 
Aryan or Latin, pigs "chuk-chuk" Turanian 
for hog, cats "puss", her old Egyptian name. 
This flattery tells upon them and, conceited 
and pleased, they make nearer and nearer 
approaches, only to find themselves — the 
larger animals at least — again beguiled into 
slavery. Various forms of passive resist- 
ance follow their disillusionment, such as the 
cow's holding up of her milk, something ana- 
logous to our holding breath, the horse's 
blowing himself out with air to avoid being 
girthed, etc. Pretending lameness is said to 
be practiced by English animals, though this 



146 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

I have never seen. Weariness Is often cured 
by turning the head homeward. A horse 
going on a line parallel to his stable may of- 
ten be observed, at each corner, throwing his 
body as far as possible in that direction, 
while his head is kept away by the rein. 

August S' Dug a few potatoes. They 
are small and poor, the drought having hit 
them hard. The water from R's spring, de- 
liciously cold in May and June, is still clear, 
but so tepid as to be unpalatable. The spring 
is only about eight feet deep in a sand bank, 
and evidently the summer heats reach its 
source. Another spring under an oak on 
Farfield is thick and undrinkable by this. 

"The rank is but the guinea stamp. 
The man's the gowd for a' that". 

Burns observed, in one of those poems full 
of refrain — so called, apparently, because 
you don't refrain — where a few telling sen- 
tences will go a great way. But to descend 
from rank to title, at what point does the 
name become more important than the per- 
son? We say "the Smith baby", "the Brown 
boy", "the Jones girl", without a thought of 
deprivation. But when we speak of "the 
Brown man", or "the Jones woman", Mr. 
Brown and Mrs. Jones are, one feels, to 
some extent, belittled. Hence it is evident 
that at some stage of adolescence — say 
about sixteen — the name, to some extent. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 147 

gains supremacy over the being who bears it. 
Hence, also, these cheap and handy titles pre- 
fixed in olden time, when but one name could 
be had for most folks — Goody Bridget, Un- 
cle Tom, and the like. Another step down- 
ward, and the custom prevailed of ascribing 
some desirable quality to the casual inferior, 
"my good fellow", "mon brave", "pretty 
one" "galantuomo", and the like. Lastly, 
when you had no immediate use for said in- 
ferior, or thought alarm might more avail 
than flattery, he was saddled with some 
odious attribute, as the intimation that he 
was far from resembling the spicy shores of 
Araby the Blest. From this it is but a step 
to the rank with which we set out, and the 
wheel has come full circle. 

August 4. The hedgerow Mr. N. broke 
last year is now showing a good stand of 
fodder corn in drills. When a thick growth 
of poison ivy has been removed, thoroughly 
grubbed out, the land is always rich and mel- 
low for a year or two. The soil just within 
said hedgerow is remarkable for its purple 
tint. I think Homer would have called it 
"wine-colored". 

Passing the corn-field today, while the 
wind blew stifiiy, what was the pleasure the 
waving maize afforded the eye? As far as I 
could analyze the sensation, it both exceeded 
and differed from that afforded by the waves 
on tall grain or grass so often referred to. 



148 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

"And waves of shadow went over the 
wheat". 

That is a pretty sight, well described; but 
the tumultuous rush and flutter of the great 
corn blades not only suggested fire rather 
than water, but was divergently fashioned in 
some way not at first apparent, but, on con- 
sideration, resulting from the planting of the 
corn in regular rows, four feet each way. 
These preserve a military regularity during 
calm, but are driven into utter confusion by 
a gust of wind. And is not this what we 
like in literature? The vagaries of nomads, 
the intention of the grasshopper do not in- 
terest us. But take a character, not especial- 
ly strong perhaps, but anchored and held to 
a definite place by discipline, ritual, conven- 
tion — a soldier, a priest, a matron — let such 
an one be fluttered and swayed by passion's 
wind, from whatever quarter, until place Is 
ignored and rules are forgotten, behold, we 
sympathize. 

August 5. The seventeen-year locust vis- 
ited this vicinity (in his thousands, that Is, 
for a few come every year) In 1877, again in 
1894. The rude W. on their wings is said to 
mean war; and this was satisfactorily car- 
ried out by the Russo-Turkish war on the 
first of these dates, the Chino-Japanese on 
the second. They were most numerous about 
the first of June, when their noise was deaf- 
ening. And their mark can still be seen on 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 149 

the young twigs they cut off then, leaving 
swollen rings. They are due again in 191 1. 

How often do we hear disputes over re- 
lationships. "He's her second cousin". "No, 
her uncle". "Why, don't you remember, 
Sam married Mary, in '74", etc., etc. Yet 
these are matters of perfect familiarity and 
daily observation. How much more puz- 
zling would they be to a visitor from another 
planet, where population was kept up by some 
kind of inarching or layering, men producing 
men, and women, women. The result of 
course, would be that in a few years there 
would be neither sex nor relatives. The au- 
thor of "Black Beauty" holds that these last 
do not exist among animals, the maternal 
connection, for a short time, alone excepted. 
This is, I suppose, the cause of the slight 
shock we generally feel when the terms "sis- 
ter" or "brother" are applied to any brutes 
beyond infancy; while as to cousinly or avun- 
cular ties, no one thinks of asserting them in 
their behalf. Perhaps sex in the vegetable 
kingdom is nowhere more apparent than in 
the dioecious white pine, two of which, grow- 
ing near together, with a crowd of vigorous 
saplings springing up around their trunks, 
strongly suggest the evergreen and gigantic 
Baucis and Philemon. 

August 6. S. More showers. Corn crop 
now well provided for, if not assured. The 
ancients were accustomed to erect an altar or 
shrine to the gods whenever lightning had 



I50 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

struck. If that were now the custom, our 
neighborhood would be thickly sprinkled 
with them; for I know of four places within 
sight of our house where the bolt descended, 
and as many more within a few minutes' 
walk. On one of these occasions, it struck a 
large buttonwood tree, then ran along a wire 
which stayed up a trellis near by, scorched 
the top of the trellis, and reached the eaves 
of the house by another short wire, along 
the gutter, splintering it in transit, and finally 
down a window frame to the ground, having 
nearly described a circle. The tree showed 
a close reticulation of streaks and grooves 
for more than a year, as if it had been cov- 
ered with a fish net, but survived. Another 
tree, an oak, was split from top to bottom, 
in 1904, one large fragment, just the length 
and shape of a fence rail, even to the tenons 
at the ends, being flung out of it to some dis- 
tance. 

August 7. Ploughing oat stubble for 
wheat. When In Italy In 1899, I saw this 
operation going on. Each plough was drawn 
by five or six animals, generally oxen, some- 
times buffaloes, and after It came a gang of 
men and women, hacking up the furrows 
with mattocks. This was the equivalent of 
our first harrowing, and no doubt very satis- 
factory In result, where labor enough can be 
had. 

How hath the drover passed away! For- 
ty, even thirty years ago, when meat was 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 151 

brought in on the hoof, he and his charge 
were a frequent sight In cities small and 
great. A sudden stoppage of traffic, a cry of 
"Here's some cattle !" a flight of timid per- 
sons into gateways or up porches, and for a 
few minutes the street was but a channel for 
the farm's condensed product — terrified, sus- 
picious, potent. Or it might be a flock of 
sheep, dusty and shambling, yet ready to 
rush like a stream in the wrong direction, 
their brace of drivers, (which ingenuous 
youth took for real shepherds, fallen from 
their high estate) constantly bawling to the 
bystanders "Head 'em off!" And how once 
In a while, never as often as we hoped, a 
stray steer would break from his fellows, 
and charge all In his path, determined on a 
hero's death. All has gone by. Messrs. 
Fleet, Brigandine & Company send us beef 
and mutton from a distance that would wear 
any hoof to the quick, done up in neat bur- 
lap jackets or shiny tin cans, and the greasy 
drover has become a motorman or chauffeur 

August 8. Coming through New York I 
could not but contrast the multitudes of men 
in the prime of life who sit listless on the 
benches In the parks, with the few country- 
men, mostly old men or boys, who labor in 
the fields. Something must be amiss when 
there is such congestion at one place, such de- 
pletion at another. Of course, farmers 
could not pay the wages these fellows would 
like. Four dollars a day or so, but would 



152 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

not small wages be better than idleness? 

"My offense is rank" the French noble of 
1792 might have quoted from Shakespeare. 
And certainly, then and since, nothing of- 
fends more than the assumption of superior- 
ity by those who have some right to make it. 
In the United States, especially, the unpar- 
donable sin is, not offense, not omission, but 
the making objection to the doings of others. 
Trespass is nothing, but he who resents tres- 
pass is an enemy of mankind. Pilfering is 
venial; but whoso objects to pilfering is, at 
the very least, far gone in avarice. Destruc- 
tion of animal life is rather fine than other- 
wise; but the critic thereof deserves to have 
the rifle turned upon himself. Indeed, when 
said destruction is practiced on a sufficiently 
large scale, and by a sufficiently Great Per- 
sonage, I have heard it stated that the G. P. 
had got an indulgence from the Smithsonian 
to shoot anything in sight. 

Divorce is a small matter, but those op- 
posed to divorce are Pharisees and hypo- 
crites. A murderer should be pardoned; 
but not he who refuses to associate with the 
murderer. In fact, the only kind of offense 
which can be safely resented here seems to 
be the lighter forms of personal assault, as 
horsewhipping or kissing. 

August g. The thrashers have reached 
our vicinity, and today V. is helping on R's. 
place. This is one of the results of labor 
scarcity quoted above. Machines are brought 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 153 

into use, and then the farmers change with 
each other; first A. helping B., then B. help- 
ing A. Thus, working double tides, they are 
enabled to live, and get a few cents or a lit- 
tle food ahead, to hand out to the starving 
poor (Supra) when they leave the park 
benches, and come on the tramp, either sin- 
gly, or in a Coxey's army. 

One sign of our decadence which has not 
attracted the attention it deserves, is the mul- 
tiplying of bath-rooms. It is not so many 
years ago that a bath-room in a country 
house was a decided rarity, while even in 
city residences they were not always found. 
Now every little cottage and villa must have 
one or two, larger and more pretentious res- 
idences three, six or eight. I have even 
known the prospective tenant of a shore cot- 
tage standing within a stone's throw of the 
Atlantic Ocean, to inquire "if the plumbing 
was in perfect order". 

We should pause and reflect what this 
crop of water blisters indicates. When the 
Romans degenerated they also built baths, 
some of whose ruins remain unto this day. 
Who has not wondered at the Baths of Cara- 
calla? But was Caracalla an exemplary per- 
son? It is true that the Roman baths were 
patterned after — or before — our depart- 
ment stores, true also that our bath-rooms 
are on the lines of the Roman cubicular dor- 
mitories, but the dropsical condition it de- 
notes makes national dissolution seem peril- 
ously near. 



154 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

August 10. The thrashers came early this 
morning, and we, having risen at five, were 
ready for them. Beside the two operators 
of the machine, our gang consisted of S. aged 
62, V. aged 59, P. aged 54, K. aged 40, L 
and an unknown Itahan about 30, and F. 
aged 16. It will be observed that most of us 
would not have been subject to conscription. 
One man tends the engine, one feeds the 
thrasher, one measures and removes the 
grain. One man sits close above the feeder 
cutting the bands and pitching sheaves down 
'^n the table, to fetch the sheaves to this last, 
two, or three take away the straw. The 
wheat, about forty bushels, was soon run off. 
Then a light shower stopped work for half 
an hour or so, but it passed, and we began on 
the oats. This was harder work, as they lay 
loose, and some of them had to be dragged 
from the other end of the barn. The feeder, 
wearing a mask to keep his eyes and throat 
from the acrid dust, receives the armfuls of 
grain, and switching them right and left on 
the table, constantly thrusts them into the 
thrasher's maw. The machine sends forth 
a constant loud hum, like a bee of Brobdig- 
nag, occasionally rising to a shrill scream of 
indignation if the supply intermits for a mo- 
ment, from its side spouts a thin jet of grain, 
and from its rear tumbles a stream of chewed- 
up straw. The thrashing was finished and 
the men departed about four, V., as is custo- 
mary, taking the team to the next place with 
our team. A common remark at parting is 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 155 

"we were glad to see ye come, and we're glad 
to see ye go". 

August II. Spent the day stowing away 
grain and straw. The wheat as I said, turned 
out forty bushels total, from three acres, 
thirteen bushels per acre, last year sixteen. 
This is below the national average. Oats one 
hundred and eighty-nine bushels from scant 
six and a half acres, thirty bushels per acre; 
a fair crop, tho' not equal to estimates. The 
straw heaps were slightly dampened by yes- 
terday's shower, but by pulling out from be- 
low until the sun had dried the stack-tops, we 
managed to get all into the barn in good 
shape. 

August 12. Went down to Ortley. More 
heavy showers, which will hinder the plow- 
ing at home ; but one has great satisfaction in 
thinking that the thrashing is over, and all 
under cover. The R. R. to Ortley runs 
through the battle-ground of Monmouth 
(June 28, 1778). We have become famil- 
iar with every foot of ground. Engllshtown, 
whence the Americans set forth, the country 
over which they charged, Tenant Church, 
where the wounded were carried, the spot 
where Washington met the retreating Conti- 
nentals, the spot where he met and rebuked 
Lee, Molly Pitcher's well, whence she was 
drawing water for her husband when he was 
killed and she took his place, St. Peter's 
Church, Freehold, where the British wound- 



156 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

ed were carried, and where Colonel Munck- 
ton lies buried — all these, Tenant Church ex- 
cepted, are within a stone's throw of the 
track. And over all shines the sun, which 
poured down his rays so hotly on that day 
that a hundred men fell dead of heat apop- 
lexy without receiving a wound. 

Ortley is mostly barren sand, but near the 
old farm house there are bits of mucky soil 
where was a sort of garden — a few rows of 
corn and potatoes. Then come the marsh 
islands which will bear nothing but salt hay. 
Ortley has its legend of the eponymist who 
cast his eye on a little creek running into the 
sea, and thought to deepen the channel, and 
make a harbor for sea-going vessels. Hav- 
ing done his best to that end he waited for 
wind and wave to be his allies. For a season 
or two they worked in his favor, scouring 
out the channel wider and deeper every tide; 
and he fondly anticipated the day when fleets 
of all nations should enter his harbor, bring- 
ing fame and wealth. Then, as is their wont, 
the currents of air and sea turned contrary, 
filling the creek with blowing sand, and form- 
ing a bar across its mouth. He then com- 
menced misanthrope, married, and reared a 
family, whom, by way of being revenged on 
mankind, he would not educate, and laid his 
bones, like Timon, amid salt marsh and 
stinging brier. 

August /J. S. Ortley consists of four cot- 
tages, one hotel, one chapel, and one bowling 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 157 

alley, now levelled by the wind. This on the sea 
side. On the bayside are two more cottages, 
and the farmhouse where dwelt the epony- 
mist. It is a gritty Eden with a few adders 
below, and many little winged serpents, hight 
mosquitoes, above. 

The growth of sand dunes may be well ob- 
served at Ortley. Many years ago, when 
the place was first laid out, the sandy hil- 
locks, or bluffs, from five to fifteen feet high, 
which marked the extreme limit of high tide, 
were cut down, carted away, and used to 
form streets and avenues. The result of this 
ill advised proceeding was that the ocean 
took advantage of the gap thus presented, 
undermined one of the houses in an alarm- 
ing manner, and threatened the destruction 
of all. Upon this, three of the cottages were 
moved back a hundred feet or so landward. 
Then the wind piled the sand into the hol- 
lows they had left, a thick growth of beach 
grass sprung up, and in another twenty years, 
the bluffs bid fair to be restored by Nature's 
hand, if she be not interfered with further. 
Here and there, where the old bluffs are cut 
into by sea or shovel, an ancient mast or hulk 
may be seen projecting from the hill's face. 
It must have been hove up there when the 
beach's level was little above the sea's, then 
piled over deeply with arenaceous deposit, 
then overgrown, and finally disinterred as 
above. 

August 14. Strong east wind, which takes 



158 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

away the mosquitoes aforesaid, and casts 
them into the bay. The swallows await and 
catch them in the lee of the station buildings. 
There must have been from a thousand to 
twelve hundred of these same swallows 
perched on the telegraph wires near the said 
station. Sixty to a length, four lengths to a 
section (between two poles) about five sec- 
tions occupied. 

With the development of aviation, we are 
likely to learn more about clouds when near- 
ly approached. Probably the thin and unsub- 
stantial stratus or cirrus would differ but lit- 
tle from a fog-bank, when entered, nor 
would one be able to tell the exact moment of 
arrival and departure. But the clear-cut cum- 
ulus, or thunder-head, standing sharp as a 
brazen helmet against the sky, must, on near 
appreach, present a front definite and un- 
qualified; and penetration of its mass can 
hardly differ from a plunge into the sea. 

Clouds coming in rapid succession from 
the north-west may often be observed, when 
nearing the coast, to meet a check, and prac- 
tically disappear, as they attain the beach 
line, even when no easterly current Is per- 
ceptible. Nor is this altogether confined to 
the coast. I remember on a cold winter's 
day, well inland, when wind-clouds came 
thickly from the north, that as they reached 
what seemed like a belt, or zone, across the 
sky some twenty degrees wide, they would 
waste and melt away, like lumps of sugar in 
water, and on passing this strip, recover, to 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 159 

some extent, their size and shape, proceeding 
as before. 

August 75. Sailing on the bay. All the 
upper part of Barnegat Bay on the ocean 
side, Is an oozy flat, from six to eighteen 
Inches deep at high-tide, Intersected by chan- 
nels of four to fifteen feet. They are mostly 
full of eel-grass, which goes out of sight 
when the tide is up, but Is much In evidence at 
the ebb. That craft known as the Barnegat 
sneak-box Is best adapted to these conditions, 
and may be found of all sizes, from six to 
thirty feet. 

Waterspouts are rare visitors In our lati- 
tude; but something resembling one I have 
seen at Ortley. The morning had been 
squally and thunderous, obliging me to re- 
turn In haste from a sailing trip, and leave 
my boat anchored In an unusual place ; about 
three p. m. wind and rain somewhat abating, 
I went to work her Into her accustomed 
berth. As I approached her the heavens 
darkened again, and I rowed hard, hoping to 
shelter from the rain in her fore-peak. Just 
as I reached her, a louder roar than that of 
rain was heard from the bay, and on looking 
westward, I saw a whirlwind rushing by, at 
perhaps half a mile's distance, heaving the 
water up Into a great mound of white foam, 
perhaps five feet high by thirty across. There 
was no answering component from the 
clouds, nor did the water seem drawn 
smoothly upward, but rather flew spattering 



i6o A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

out from the progressing whiteness, as from 
a twirhng mop. I could not see what hap- 
pened when it struck the land, as an island in- 
tervened, but what was evidently the same 
gust came round on half circle, tore a door 
from one of the cottages, and went out to 
sea. 

August i6. Among its other drawbacks, 
Barnegat counts the "mud sinks" to be found 
here and there, free from the sand which 
qualifies most of the bottom. They are spots 
of soft clay, black, tenacious, fathomless, 
and he who once sank in them would rise no 
more. 

Salvage — jettison, and the like, are words 
almost as unfamiliar to the average lands- 
man of today as fief and deodand. But on 
the coast they are still living terms. Any- 
thing cast upon the beach, or tossing in the 
surf, is the property of the first finder, as 
against all but the original owner. Should 
the desired article be too heavy for imme- 
diate removal, he registers his claim, so to 
speak, by placing the object in question — 
usually lumber of fair quality — above high 
water mark, and sticking a splinter beside it, 
occasionally adding a rag of some color, as 
may be convenient. The original owner, as 
stated above, has still a claim; but he can 
only make it good by paying one-half the 
value of the property in question. As only 
very valuable articles would be worth the 
cost and trouble involved, he seldom or nev- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK i6i 

er appears. Among the goods thus thrown 
up I can mention sawed lumber, shingles, 
railroad ties, rope, coal, (bituminous) log- 
wood, oars, chairs, wire, bottles, boxes, 
tools, and fishing rods. The ownership of 
landed property on the ocean front seems to 
convey no special right in this respect, how- 
ever. 

August ij. Sailed down to the bridge, 
then crossed over, strong south wind abeam, 
and even with a double reefed sail we heeled 
and rolled, sending the tip of the boom un- 
der more than once, whereat our bow would 
begin to sway off from the wind, and the roll- 
ers rushing up from the lower bay threaten 
to swamp us. The skiff, which towed astern 
went almost bow under once or twice and 
shipped considerable water. Had she filled, 
we would probably have had to cut her loose, 
or fill ourselves. But at length we made 
Good Luck point, where in a sandy lee, we 
bailed out the skiff, took another reef, and 
then came up the bay flying. 

Wind is most easily observed in its effects 
on water, from the little black flaw rushing 
for a moment over the glassy pond to the 
huge billow. But perhaps this can no where 
be better seen than in a sail-boat running be- 
fore the breeze. The air, encountering the 
sail flatly, and unable to slip away, as when 
the canvas is presented at an angle, partly 
sends the boat onward, and partly pours 
away from It on all sides, but especially 



1 62 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

downward, where a web of small black wrin- 
kles may always be seen beneath the boom. 
Of course, could we have the sail framed in 
fluid, it would be almost equally surrounded 
by corrugations — not quite, because of the 
rake of the mast. When a pennant is at- 
tached to gaff or forestay, this may some- 
times be seen failing to indicate the wind's 
direction with perfect exactness, because of 
this outrush of air. The same thing is said 
to prevail on high marine cliffs, where during 
a gale, the sheep prefer to feed on the very 
brink of the precipice, as being there in com- 
parative calm. The gale, meeting the rock, 
and being only able to escape upward, by its 
perpendicular thrust for a time conquers the 
horizontal current, so as to form a windless 
arch or tunnel or bower, along the cliffs edge. 

August i8. Could Robinson Crusoe live 
on Ortley beach? Water, not of the best, 
but drinkable, can be had by digging eight or 
ten feet. Wood in abundance for house and 
fuel, some coal, chairs, sofas, mats, oars, li- 
quors, drugs, oil, paint, brooms, hats, fish, 
clams, and crabs. Clothing seems to be the 
only thing lacking. 

The swimming animal retains his usual 
posture and action, only slightly emphasizing 
the latter; the swimming man must alter 
both. That humblest kind of natation, 
"Dog-paddling", is the only progress by 
water which at all resembles any progress by 
land possible to humanity, namely, crawling 



A FARMER^S NOTE BOOK 163 

on all fours, which may be one reason why 
very young children are said to learn most 
easily. It is difficult for the beginner to real- 
ize that it is the water that must bear him 
up, and not his own legs or arms. Fat, a hin- 
drance to every other kind of exertion, is the 
swimmer's aid. Almost all the famous 
swimmers — Webb, Byron, Franklin — have 
been men inclining to a full habit, while bone 
and sinew, however abundant, tend to sink 
one. George Meredith has written more 
sympathetically and understandingly of this 
matter than any author I know, though 
Thomas Hardy, at times, runs him close. 
One or two chapters in "Lord Orment and 
his Aminta" might have been dictated by a 
Triton. Among poets Thomson has devoted 
most space to the topic, though Shakespeare 
does it, like everything else, best. 

The swimmer's progress is an unceasing 
union of faith and works. He must believe 
that the water will sustain him, must cast 
himself upon it with absolute abandon. With- 
out this, his own efforts, however vigorous 
and prolonged, are of no avail. 

Plunging about, and "attempting to kneel 
upon the surface of the water", as some one 
puts it, are worse than useless. This trust 
must be cultivated until it becomes second 
nature. The deeper he sinks in the water, as 
long as he looks on the sun and draws 
breath, the more the water buoys him up; the 
higher he rises from the water the sooner he 
sinks in exhaustion. But with this goes the 



1 64 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

need for effort. Though he should float on 
the waters for hours together, it would ad- 
vance him nothing. He must avail himself 
of a manner of progress he has never used as 
man, humbly taking the child and the animal 
as exemplars, abandoning the erect posture 
and the sounding tread, until at last, well 
nigh one with the element he moves in, sway- 
ing like its currents and striking like its 
waves, he reaches the desired haven. 

August ig. Every scrap of animal matter 
cast upon the beach is soon devoured by sand- 
fleas. They are fiercely carnivorous, and 
though shunning anything that stirs, if one 
lays a finger among them, refraining from 
movement they will fasten upon it in two or 
three minutes. And they in turn are eaten by 
the snipes. 

Many are the books whose success con- 
sisted in hitting something else from that 
aimed at. Shenstone's "Schoolmistress" was 
written as a parody of Spenser, the ''Com- 
pleat Angler" is utterly out of date as re- 
spects the procuring of fish, Rabelais's alle- 
gory is, to most readers, wholly incompre- 
hensible. "Don Quixote" went much further 
than laughing Spain's chivalry away, "Little 
Women" took Bunyan for its precedent. 
These are all cases where a miss was better 
than a mile, where the arrow made its own 
target, where the too fortunate emissary be- 
came, merely by the fact of his success, the 
superior of the master. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 165 

Fish-hawks are of frequent occurrence at 
Ortley, sometimes wheehng and floating high 
in air, less often flying so close to the water 
that the reflected image may be seen follow- 
ing just beneath from a long distance off. 
Unlike the gulls, who skim along and snatch 
up their prey from the surface ; the hawk, af- 
ter a poise of a few moments, folds his wings 
and plunges straight down, sometimes going 
entirely out of sight, generally emerging 
with a strugghng fish. Sometimes the efforts 
of the quarry are too much for his captor, 
who is obhged to let him fall again; but gen- 
erally he is borne away. On one occasion I 
saw the hawk, just as he had struck a fish, 
foiled by a wave, which broke directly upon 
him, and obliged him to drop everything to 
escape. 

August 20. S. The phosphorescence seen 
in the water and sand after dark is undoubt- 
edly due to fragments of dead jelly-fish. One 
hardly ever sees them alive here, but I re- 
member rowing near Prout's Neck, Maine, 
one afternoon when they thronged the water 
like great inverted glass bowls — yellow, 
blue, pink, — scarcely two alike in color or 
size. 

Quicksands have also done their part In 
literature, being of their nature highly meta- 
phorical. The end of Ravenswood, and that 
of Carver, in Lorna Doone, will at once oc- 
cur to everyone. The composition of these 
mires seems somewhat in doubt. Mud alone 



1 66 A FARMER^S NOTE BOOK 

will not do it, nor yet sand. The "sinks" re- 
ferred to above are spots of peat like the rest 
of the bay bottom, only thinner. There may 
be a slight admixture of clay in them, or they 
may be spots where there would be springs 
of fresh water if the bay was dried. The 
quick sands are of a different make-up. The 
spring theory will not avail for them, as the 
sand surrounding an upland spring is some- 
times perfectly hard. It is possible that the 
sand at such places may be differently shaped 
from the bulk of it, and instead of being 
sharp and angular, tending to bind, like the 
broken stone in a macadam road, it is oval 
or globular in shape, sliding down at a touch, 
like eggs or balls piled together. When to 
this is added the slip of water, slowly rising 
or as slowly drawing away, perhaps a quick- 
sand might be the result. 

August 21. There is most of the summer 
time, a current of air from sea to land, which 
is deflected upward as it leaves the coast. 
The land breezes form a quoin, as it were, of 
great depth inshore, but coming to a thin 
edge on the beach. Usually about lo A. M., 
the sea wind springs up, and the quoin's 
point is crumbled, eaten into, and broken 
away, as the salt air pushes a mile or two in- 
land. Occasionally it goes further still until 
the east wind is felt on our farm. Again, the 
land breeze has the better and the quoin is 
pushed well out to sea, cutting the tops off 
the breakers as they roll in. I have sailed 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 167 

on the bay in light and baffling eastern puffs 
when, two miles further in, I could see the 
sails dashing to and fro with a strong north- 
wester. 

August 22. High wind, preventing sail- 
ing, so rowed about the coves and broads. 
As I came down one creek I saw a small dark 
object ahead, which I presently discovered to 
be a wild duckling, black as coal, and not 
larger than a new hatched chicken. The lit- 
tle soot-ball swam across the channel without 
apparent fear, though I was within a few 
feet of it, scrambled up the muddy bank like 
a child climbing its piazza steps, and disap- 
peared among the sedge. 

Forty years ago, "Salt Water Day" was, 
to the Jerseyman, one of those unwritten fes- 
tivals which grow up by accretion, something 
resembling May Day in old England. The 
second Saturday in August was the date of 
this ceremony, when even a late crop of oats 
would be housed, the corn laid by, and fall 
work not yet begun. Then would every 
farmer within twenty miles of the shore 
hitch up his carryall, and start with his fam- 
ily for the Atlantic. Progress was slow over 
the sandy ways which knew not Macadam, 
and it was generally noon before the far-off 
sparkling brine flashed on their vision. Then 
followed the noon meal, then interchange of 
civilities with neighbors, and then the great 
event of the day — the Bath. Arrayed in old 
trousers, or faded wrappers, all underwent 



i68 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

what was probably, for many of the adults, 
the sole complete lavation of the year, the 
carryall serving as a bathing box for each in 
succession. This rite performed, they toiled 
homeward, to cold hearths and late milkings. 
But now those good old simple days have de- 
parted, bathing suits and weekly trips have 
come in, and though "Salt Water Day" sur- 
vives as a name, it is given to steamboat ex- 
cursions. 

August 2j. Mended sail. It is not well 
done, but as I said later to those who shud- 
dered at the sight, "The next time you have 
anything to mend, tack it by one edge to a 
post, and then see how neatly you can mend 
it while it slats and flutters in a stiff breeze". 

A harrow makes an excellent stop-gap in 
hedge or fence, a bayonet fastened over a 
half-bushel measure does very well for shell- 
ing corn; a leaky boat may be bailed with 
one's shoe; a bunch of seaweed furnished a 
fair sponge, a boat past recovery is the sea- 
side flower-bed. A small nail will take the 
place of a button; carpets can be laid by 
stamping in the tacks, a wheel tire may be 
fastened on with a hair-pin. A tight wisp of 
straw shoes a horse for an hour, twisted 
newspapers form a very good rope, a tall hat 
and handkerchief make a good life preserv- 
er, harness may be mended with hairs from 
the horse's tail. 

Fugitives hidden in a dung-hill have 
breathed through a tube of quills, water 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 169 

enough to preserve life has been got from 
green maple sticks with one end in the lire. 
Dutch cheeses have served for cannon-balls, 
an egg-shell was the old Celtic measure for a 
dram of spirits. Ropes of hay wound round 
the legs are the Russian stockings, horses' 
skulls formed the Tartar's chairs, a ring, cut 
and barbed, will make a fish-hook. A foot 
of "T" rail does as an anvil, garden can be 
dug with a broadaxe, I have seen a boat 
steered with a spade. 

August 24. Sailed to Island Heights this 
morning, getting more and more wind as we 
worked over. Came back rushing sending a 
great water furrow out on either side, and 
the skiff repeating same astern. In afternoon 
tried again, but the breeze was so strong that 
in beating down the channel the anchor was 
nearly lost overboard, only hanging to the 
wale-streak by one fluke. Had it gone over 
we had been tipped to our undoing. 

If Dante has drawn any similes from the 
sea-cost for his Commedia, with the excep- 
tion of likening the roar of the dark tornado 
which carries and torments the impure souls 
to the stormy ocean's sound, they have es- 
caped my memory. But on the Maine coast, 
between Old Orchard Beach and the Saco 
River, most people know, or have heard of 
the excellence of the aforesaid beach — hard, 
level, clean and flat as a floor. But traveling 
a little further south and crossing a little val- 
ely and stream by a trestle, one comes on 



I70 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

quite a different scene. An uneven flat, full 
of puddles, sticky soil, half sand, half clay, 
and covered with lumps of the latter mate- 
rial, like the heads of slain giants, made up 
what might have seemed to him a suitable 
setting for the punishment of wicked gladia- 
tors. The sun went down reddening the 
pools, the clay lumps took on a still greater 
semblance of humanity, the blind and dev- 
ious path became invisible, and the trestle 
stood up like a gibbet. 

August 2§. Easterly storm all day. Went 
down to the Merlin and screwed on her name 
in brass letters. Knowing if I dropped one 
in the cove I should never see it more, I tied 
each letter to the horse (bar on which the 
sheet-block sides) with a bit of string, then 
put in one screw, then untied it and set the 
other screws. Then towed her to a better 
berth with skiff, at the rate of about one 
yard per minute, then crowded into the fore- 
peak between mast and stem, and had a nap. 
The mingled odor of the tar, salt, and mud 
was no bad sleeping potion, while the rain 
pelted on the deck, and the boat swung and 
swayed at her mooring. 

Among the violent contrasts In which Eng- 
land, perhaps beyond any other civilized 
land, abounds, and the consequent opportuni- 
ties offered to authors, are her tides. How 
numerous are the fictitious or historical indi- 
viduals or parties In Great Britain's litera- 
ture cut off by a high tide ! King John at the 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 171 

Wash, the Scottish martyrs in the Solway, 
Sir Arthur and his daughter in the "Anti- 
quary", Mary in the Sands O'Dee, and many 
others it were tedious to name. What have 
we to set against this? True, the Bay of Fun- 
dy has the highest tides in the world, and 
Mrs. Spofford has got one heroic rescue out 
of them. But who that one cares about ever 
lived at the Bay of Fundy? True, also, that 
along the New England coast, the tides are 
almost as high as in Great Britain, twelve to 
eighteen feet, but the rocks never seem to be 
of a kind to entrap any one. And from 
Connecticut to Florida the average rise is 
only about four feet, a difference which can 
result in nothing worse than contemptible 
wet feet. 

August 26. Every bit of clothing I put on 
this morning from shirt to shoes, was wet. 
This partly because the colony was agitated 
last night by a report that a vessel was driv- 
ing on shore. And a light was to be seen 
bobbing up and down, apparently on the 
verge of the breakers. Some said they saw 
rockets, but almost any one can do this if 
caught in the eye by a rain-drop while gazing 
at a light. I walked a mile up shore to in- 
vestigate, and other the like exploits were 
performed by various neighbors. Next day 
it appeared that a recent law required a lan- 
tern to be hung in each fish-pound on dark 
nights. 

The combined brightness and plasticity of 



172 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

the Greek mind shows forth in nothing more 
than in the fact that Socrates was able to per- 
suade them by argument. No doubt he had 
great dialectic powers, but no man has ever 
been able to do it since, nor, probably, could 
he have done it with any other people. The 
Greeks made better judges than advocates, 
and consequently took pleasure in listening 
to an able barrister. The Romans were, just 
before they were generous — in other words, 
it was only when their national existence was 
nearly gone that they had recourse to mag- 
nanimity, as witness their sole recorded in- 
stance of ethnic generosity, their behavior 
to Varro after Cannae, and their ideal was 
a dictator, one or many-headed. The Celts 
are gregarious, and have shown the highest 
loyalty to rulers who neither belonged to 
their race or did anything for them. The 
Scotch are unconvincible as machines, and 
their idol is Burns, who never tried to prove 
anything at all. The inhabitants of the Great 
Republic have no racial traits, being a mix- 
ture of all nations; consequently, their ideal 
government is rule by an affrighted majority, 
and their greatest pleasure consists in gazing 
on that composite photograph of the United 
States, T. R. 

August 2y. S. Walked down beach to the 
south. The shore is strewn with bamboos 
large and small, which it were pleasant to 
imagine wafted from the coast of Ind., but 
I much fear they are but fishing poles, cast 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 173 

away by parties on the Banks. 

Idiots have a family likeness. As every 
one knows, the word at first signified one 
who held no public office; a strictly private 
individual. Descending in meaning, as most 
words do, it came to represent one who could 
not hold office, and finally, one who could do 
nothing like others. The vacant stare, the 
open mouth, the dancing gait, are common to 
them all. Such an one I can remember, who 
for many years went to and fro in a town 
with which I am familiar. His predecessor 
in office was a loathsome object to contem- 
plate, macrolingual and orifluent, but the 
present incumbent has little repulsive about 
him. I indicated him to several friends at 
different times, as follows : — 

Myself — "That is the village idiot." 

Miss A. — "Poor creature, he looks it." 

Myself — "That is the village", etc. 

Mr. B. — "Just the kind of job I'd like to 
have." 

Myself — "That is the village", etc. 

Miss C. — "It is well for the town that has 
only one." 

Myself — "That is the village", etc. 

Mr. D.— "Any relation?" 

How many other occasions will arise when 
this person may be the cause of wit in others 
remains to be seen; the above are to date. 

August 28. In evening there was a very 
high tide, and the surf was high. The break- 
ers rushed over the crest of the beach, usual 



174 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

high water mark, and formed a pool beyond 
while now and then a little wave from this 
would lap the sea wall. Dwellers at the ocean 
edge are like the Indian princes with their 
pet tigers, pleased when they roared and 
showed their teeth, but fleeing in terror if 
they showed signs of breaking their bars. By 
looking over the rail of a porch, or other 
long straight object at the ocean's horizon, 
one may perceive the rotundity of the world. 
It rises with a convexity of about three inches 
in ten feet. 

August 2g. Children floating in the surf 
in bait car. The little waves at low tide curl 
over and scrape up a small bar of pebbles, 
about two paces in. Here are also found 
the only stones of these parts, mis-shapen 
lumps of pumice, or something resembling 
it, and in contour most like the worn down 
knuckle bones of some large animal. 

Shakespeare's "Seven Ages" as detailed 
by Jaques, are generally supposed not to be 
for an age, but for all time. And this is 
probably true of six of them. The infant, 
the lover, the soldier, the justice, the lean 
and slippered pantaloon and the mere obliv- 
ious, still mewl, sigh, quarrel, saw, pant, and 
forget, as they did four hundred years ago; 
but he of the satchel and the shining face 
no longer creeps to school? On the contrary, 
he races thither, having been, to that end, 
helped first to breakfast, and very positive 
with his family about the clock. The road to 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 175 

learning has lost all of its terror, and most 
of its tedium. No more are "tway birchen 
twigs" seen in the corner, or the ferule lying 
on the desk, or the tawse hanging over the 
chair back. They have followed the born- 
book and the slate to the limbo of things for- 
gotten, having probably been used to kindle 
the last fire in the last open stove. Even the 
sports, once considered mere accessories, and 
asides, only fit to furnish metaphors for the 
musing poet, have now been brought well 
to the front, and in conversation and adver- 
tisement seem to be considered of quite equal 
importance with study. So far has this gone 
that when the child knows not how to play, a 
depth of stupidity Gray never imagined, an 
instructor is detailed to that special end. 

The first girls' school of which we have 
any authentic and circumstantial account — 
for the slight hints and references dropped 
by Mariana, Bianca, and Helena hardly de- 
serve attention — would seem to be that kept 
at Taunton about 1680 by Miss Susan Blake, 
daughter of the great admiral. Apparently 
she might have thriven long, had she not 
mixed politics 'with learning. But when 
she allowed, or induced, or compelled her 
pupils to present Monmouth, soon after his 
landing, with a copy of the Scriptures, she 
gained, it is true, a small niche in history, 
but also life imprisonment for herself, and 
heavy fines for all her scholars. 

August 50. A young porpoise, about two 



176 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

feet long, was cast upon the beach last night. 
Its horizontal tail and crescent-shaped spira- 
cle showed it was the whale's small cousin. 
It was a female, about two feet long, black 
above, white below; and they said when cast 
up it squeaked like a small pig. The moth- 
er porpoise (of whom we saw three or four 
yesterday) grunts like a hog. 

How was it possible for a musical instru- 
ment to be of straw, and oat straw at that? 
Willow, elder, reeds, and the like, might 
readily lend themselves to piping and fluting, 
but one cannot conceive of the thin, short, 
brittle, and easily split oaten straw bearing 
a blast, or producing a sound. Even to Mil- 
ton's time, the art seems to have endured; 
and though he speaks of the result with much 
contempt, he does not deny its existence. It 
might have been supposed that the enthu- 
siasm of the audience supplied all that was 
wanting In the skill of the performer, or the 
excellence of the instrument; but when we 
consider the high quality of the speeches and 
sculpture that have come down to us from 
classic days. It may reasonably be imagined 
that all their artistic achievement was on a 
high level, even the simplest, however It may 
have degenerated by Milton's time. 

August 5/. Shoal of blue-fish, at first far 
out, a spot of sharper ripples than usual, 
overflown by gulls. They rapidly approached 
the shore and for a moment leaped and tum- 
bled In the wash of the surf, where the water 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 177 

was not over two feet deep. Many rushed 
for lines and squids, but the fish were off be- 
fore their would-be captors got busy. 

It seems probable that the day will come 
when our nutriment will be derived from 
lozenges minted out of air. One of 
those admirable men whose life is spent in 
discovering the things they had declared 
could not exist will invent some instrument 
on the bullet-mould order by a dexterous 
snap of which a lozenge may be pinched out 
of the atmosphere, containing all necessary 
ailment, and of flavor to suit any taste. They 
could be carried with great convenience in 
the vest-pocket — two for breakfast, four for 
dinner, three for supper, and there you are. 
The author of "Peter Wilkins" — perhaps 
the best of many imitations of "Robinson 
Crusoe" — represents his nocturnal race; 
who alternately flew and swam with whale 
bone growths, called graundees, and lived in 
caves like bats, as lighting up their caverns 
with an apparatus singularly resembling the 
electric light of the present time. The wiring, 
the nature of the brightness afforded, and, 
above all, the size and shape of the bulbs 
containing the light, are described with an 
exactness truly wonderful when we reflect 
that the book was written a hundred years 
before Edison was born, when the electrical 
machine was not even a toy. 

Sept'cmher i. Ten years ago today was the 
earthquake. Lying in bed in the morning, I 



178 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

was awakened by the clock striking 6 a. m. 
and almost at the instant I felt the house 
waggle to and fro, like a snapper on a whip 
when one shakes it. I knew as by instinct 
what it was and was aware of slight nausea. 
There was no accompanying sound that I can 
remember, nor did anything fall. 

Luxury came long before comfort, adorn- 
ment before use. Beautiful jewels, and 
splendid weapons, were worn by persons 
whose food and dwellings were of the coars- 
est and rudest. A shirt once worn by Charles 
I. is said to be of linen so coarse that no la- 
borer would put up with it now, though the 
embroidery upon it is beautiful. The medi- 
aevals could make glorious stained glass 
windows, but not roofs and walls that would 
keep out wind and weather. The cups and 
dishes of Palissy frequently contained sour 
and unwholesome bread and beer. The to- 
mato is one of our most common, and per- 
haps one of our most useful, vegetables; 
grown by the acre, eaten fresh and canned, in 
millions. Yet not so many years ago it was 
only grown in gardens as an ornamental 
shrub, for the sake of its bright red fruit, 
then called love-apples, and deemed deleter- 
ious, if not poisonous, while a lady I can re- 
member has related that in her youth she 
once went to a party with a couple of said 
love apples in her hair, by way of adornment. 

September 2. Though we had one ex- 
tremely hot spell, and much squally, rainy 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 179 

weather since, there has been very little thun- 
der or lightning this summer. Some years ago 
a man I knewwas killed bylightning between 
the stilts of his plough. He had delayed 
leaving the field until the storm broke, and 
was just entering the barn-yard, when the 
bolt struck his horse, singeing the animal's 
skin and scorching the harness, ran along the 
plow beam and up the handles, and struck 
him just below the breast bone, so that he 
fell dead on the spot. Mr. N. also lost two 
horses about 1890, the lightning striking the 
grating of their windows, passing along the 
iron edging of the mangers, and up the hal- 
ter chains into their bodies. 

September j. S. Peacocks are but little 
kept in this neighborhood, though I remem- 
ber one in Penn's place who used to sit on a 
high limb at the gate and scream when wag- 
ons passed under. Once a peahen strayed 
over to our place, and encountered a com- 
mon hen with chicks. This last, anxious for 
her brood, immediately lost temper and self- 
control, and retreated slowly before the mag- 
lificent and gigantic stranger, scolding, fum- 
ing and kicking up the dust. Madame Pavo, 
meanwhile, a trespasser, and by so much in 
the wrong, advanced delicately, letting fall 
an occasional remark on the scenery, and ut- 
terly ignoring in her dignified grace Dame 
Gallin's vulgar outcries. 

September ^, Returning from Ortley, 



i8o A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

found the fall planting well forward, and 
considerable brush cutting on the old field 
done. The corn Is now In full tassel and 
silk, sending forth a savory odor like warm 
bread. One evening about this time of year, 
calm, warm and moist, when coming through 
an unfamiliar region, I could distinguish the 
crops on many of the fields by the smell — 
corn, potatoes digging, buckwheat, second 
crop hay, cabbages, turnips. 

Generosity is undignified. I do not refer 
to lavlshness, which Is quite a different thing. 
The scattering of small coins among the pop- 
ulace hath ever been held regal and magnifi- 
cent; but the bestowing of large gifts on in- 
dividuals Is a thing hard to handle grace- 
fully. Even Aurora made a mess of It with 
TIthonus. Rain Is lavish; pumps and spouts 
generous. But rain has supplied much poetic 
imagery; whereas pumps, gargoyles, sluices, 
and the whole tribe of spouts generally are 
ludicrous and grotesque, until they become 
large enough to be terrific. But this Is best 
shown In the vegetable kingdom, where the 
fruit should never be conspicuous above the 
plant that bears it. The acorn, the chestnut, 
the strawberry, the grape, have high place In 
literature and art, because, however numer- 
ous, they are Individually so much smaller 
than the tree or vine on which they hang. 
The fig-tree, diverging somewhat from the 
above, holds a middle ground; its leaf comes 
forward early and prominently, its fruit is 
synonymous with a trifle. But the generous 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK i8i 

plants or herbs, the pumpkin, squash, and 
cabbage, being few in number, but of great 
size, while the vine, a stem which bears them, 
is practically negligible, have this many a 
year been held the butts and clowns of na- 
ture. 

September 5. Cut weeds and wild car- 
rots. Heavy showers, the last few days have 
brought these last up wonderfully. The corn 
is sending out its brace roots, like fingers and 
thumbs pushed through frail gloves, to clutch 
at the earth, and guy up the stalk. Were it 
not for this, it could never bear up its heavy 
burden of maize against the autumn winds 
and rains, but would fall prostrate with its 
load. 

"The pasture's getting short!" is the cry 
often heard about this time of year. "We 
must fence in another". When the cows be- 
gin to stretch their necks through the fences, 
and go down on their knees to get their noses 
under the bottom rail, one knows a change 
must be made. Supposing that the usual ro- 
tation is followed — corn, oats (or potatoes) 
wheat, hay, pasture — it follows that the hay 
field, now coming up to Fall feed, will gen- 
erally furnish a good bite in August. But 
this is usually next to the cornfield, whose 
green and juicy stalks offer a greater tempta- 
tion than any grass. Fences are poor in mid- 
summer, posts that seemed strong in spring 
wabble and crack, rails are loose and short 
(a rail seems to lose about an inch in length 



1 82 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

each year, and perhaps it does) the ground 
is hard to dig, and wires stretched now may 
snap when frost comes. Even after all these 
hindrances have been surmounted, and the 
cows turned in, they do not evince the grati- 
tude one would like to see. Having filled 
themselves well for a day or two, they find 
the sharp stubble beneath the rowen prickly 
to the nose, long for accustomed ways, and, 
should chance serve, may be seen trying to 
get back to the old field. 

September 6. Peaches now at their best 
but many of them spoiled by cracking, owing 
to the wet weather. It was about this time 
more than twenty years ago, that I, being in 
the field a quarter of a mile off, saw a carpen- 
ter who was repairing the house gather a 
hatful of peaches from one of the trees in 
the garden, and hide them in a hole under 
the shed. When I came up I made no re- 
mark, but gathered up his booty and took it 
indoors. My eyes were good then. 

In the gradual merging of farm into vil- 
lage, and village into town, the domesticated 
animals gradually drop away. First goes 
the cow. As her pasture becomes more scan- 
ty and difficult to reach, as her owners grad- 
ually lose time and taste for milking, the sta- 
ble and crib are turned to other uses, and the 
pail rusts unheeded. The pig follows next. 
Living in narrow quarters, and on the rem- 
nants of our own food, he can hold his own 
somewhat longer. But the time comes 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 183 

when his noise and filth shock sensitive ears 
and nostrils beyond endurance, when laws of 
sanitation are drawn against him, and he also 
falls into the background. The goat is the 
last to go, at least if the soil is rough and 
rocky, as was upper New York, and as is the 
town whereof I write. On granite ledges 
and shaly cliffs, he can obtain sustenance 
where another beast would starve. On a 
precipice some sixty feet high, thickly grown 
with ivy and ailanthus, with grass and weeds 
on every little niche, I once saw three goats 
and four kids appear, who had been driven 
from the field at the top by a dog. Like a 
living cascade they poured down the cliff, 
fastening their hoofs in every crevice, spring- 
ing away quicker than the loose rock could 
slip from under them, and reaching the bot- 
tom almost as soon as their pursuer could 
have fallen. 

September 7. Dug potatoes. One out of 
three is cut or pierced by hoe or fork. As the 
tubers are generally softer than the earth, 
and always softer than the stones, the dig- 
ging tools glance from these last and find the 
potato the line of least resistance. Some one 
has said that the legs of the peasant in Mil- 
let's "Angelus" look like sticks; and some 
one else has replied that after you have been 
digging potatoes all day your legs do look — 
and feel — like sticks. 

In some ways labor once considered neces- 
sary is lessened, in others multiplied and in- 



1 84 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

creased. It used to be thought essential, or 
at any rate desirable, in the old monkish 
days, when the good brethren would set out 
an orchard, first to lay a pavement under it 
at a depth of four feet. As any one can see, 
this would involve huge toil; while the ad- 
vantage would come from the thorough dig- 
ging and fining of the earth necessitated, not 
from the pavement. Coming to more mod- 
ern times, an asparagus bed was wont to be 
prepared for with almost as much ceremony 
as an expected infant. The ground was to 
be "trenched", that is, dug one spade deep, 
wheeled away, then the lower soil, thus ex- 
posed, dug another spade deep, plenteously 
enriched, and the upper earth put back. Now 
all thought necessary is to run deep furrows, 
set the roots in them, and gradually fill in 
earth from each side during the first year. 
Peas, again, used to be provided with brush 
or strings to climb upon, now are allowed to 
stand If they can, or fall if they will, and 
seem very little the worse, either as respects 
quantity or quality. 

The forehanded farmer, or rather truck- 
er, for it is generally done by those who have 
more energy than land, frequently grows two 
crops on the same land, either simultaneous- 
ly or successively. An Instance of the former 
is planting corn and beans together — whence 
arose the fable of the former growing so 
fast that it pulled up the latter — corn and 
pumpkins, which does better, or corn and 
turnips, which only succeeds In a wet season. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 185 

When strawberries were first cultivated for 
market, a general plan was to plant sweet 
corn between the rows, and next year the 
lines of corn-buts served as guides to pick by, 
when the vines had run together. Beans are 
sometimes planted between potatoes, also 
lettuce, also cucumbers. The disadvantage 
of all these arrangements is that much care is 
required in digging the potatoes not to tread 
on the young succeeding crop. Spinach may 
be sown in fall and cut in early spring, 
ground plowed and planted to potatoes, and 
these followed by celery, so as to get three 
crops within the year. It sometimes happens 
that in close proximity and violent contrast 
to a field under this intensive culture may be 
seen another bearing its second crop of an- 
nual weeds. 

September 8. The pilferers of apples 
now are much in evidence, from the stroller 
who picks up one or two as he passes to the 
gang who come with bags and a business like 
air. Finding one of these last bands at work, 
I pursued them on horseback. They reached 
the fence just a little ahead, but as they 
climbed it quickly, while I had to let down 
tke bars, they were half across the next field 
by the time I had mounted again. The pro- 
cess was renewed again and yet again, be- 
fore we reached a road. Along this I once 
more gave chase, and had nearly overtaken 
the fugitives, when they broke from the 
wood road into another field, through which 



1 86 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

I let them go with what remained of their 
plunder, reflecting that I had given them a 
good run. 

Fighting a forest fire is the hardest work 
one can be engaged in — for in a real battle 
excitement sustains, and victory inspires. But 
even the conquerors lose when contending 
with fire, and the enemy can only be headed 
off and checked, never slain. One's coat is 
perhaps the handiest weapon, but it is un- 
commonly hard on the coat. A horse blank- 
et rolled and soaked is more durable, but re- 
quires both hands. A young cedar tree does 
very well, but soon wears out. A shovel will 
serve, if the fire is chiefly in grass, but will 
not fit round trees or among bushes, and soon 
jars the hands. With each or any of 
these tools you beat and batter down the ad- 
vancing line of flame, looking for thin spots, 
now and then obliged to retreat from a fierc- 
er blast than common, choking with smoke, 
eyes watering and hair frizzling. Thoreau 
has recorded how he once started a forest 
fire which did considerable damage, but after 
a few hour's remorse, succeeded in throwing 
the matter off his mind with facility remark- 
able in a man so severe on other's faults. 
Once, retreating from fire into a damp hol- 
low, I found, deep in sphagnum moss, ice re- 
maining in June. 

September g. Being over on Farfield, and 
an automobile passing every few minutes, I 
took occasion to time them. The frontage 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 187 

of the field Is about 600 feet, the legal rate 
of speed 20 miles per hour, which would give 
20 seconds as the time for passing this space. 
About half of those I timed kept to or below 
this speed, several got down to 15 seconds, 
and one or two to 10^ — nearly forty miles per 
hour. 

Liberty is dear to all animals, as well as to 
man; most naturally, seeing that they had it 
first and kept it longest. As respects our do- 
mesticated stock, one of the advantages of 
breeding them on the farm is that they never 
want to go far from the place where they 
were born; whereas an animal purchased 
elsewhere is liable for years to make for 
parts unknown. Perhaps a pig forgets his 
birthplace soonest; one getting loose as soon 
as brought in has been known, after a long 
chase, to return to the spot where he was tak- 
en from the wagon. A runaway cow is much 
more easily tracked than a vagrant horse, 
but is also much more likely to take to the 
woods, where it is surprising how well her 
coat harmonizes with the leaves. A fowl can 
generally be run down, unless It Is capable of 
taking long flights across obstacles, but when 
weary will hide with great subtlety. A pig 
will double, sheep so seldom run singly that 
their conduct Is diflicult to foretell. A run- 
away horse, unless wild with fright, loves a 
dry and smooth path. I recollect one, who In 
his career, turned out for every puddle, and 
another who took a course down a newly set 
row of strawberries, because the ground 



1 88 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

there was nicely raked, while on each side it 
was rough and lumpy. 

September lO. S. Baseball is now played 
on many fields about town, where the after- 
math has been cut, so as to leave clean 
ground. It is illegal on Sunday, but is mostly 
winked at, unless the players are peculiarly 
turbulent, or the owner objects. On one oc- 
casion when a game was started in a field ad- 
joining ours I went to a gap where I was in 
full view, took out paper and pencil and be- 
gan to write. The game soon languished, 
and a committee came over to ask what I was 
writing. But on this point I would give 
them no satisfaction. They tossed the ball 
aimlessly a while, then began to steal away 
by twoes and threes, and in half an hour the 
field was empty. 

September ii. Rose early, rode before 
breakfast. The automobile seldom appears 
at this hour, and farmers and icemen are 
generally the only ones encountered. Rab- 
bits are often to be seen, but they seem to 
realize that a horse could not hurt them if 
he tried. 

Animals seem to have a better idea of bal- 
ance and poise than man, which is surprising 
when one considers how little help their eyes 
give them. A man may strike a blow, or de- 
liver a kick at a football with great accuracy, 
but he always can see what he is about. Let 
him kick or strike backward, and he makes 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 189 

sad work of it. But even a young calf can 
send in a coup de pied with extraordinary 
directness, while it is a pleasure to see even 
the clumsy cow take a leap over a bar or two 
into her pasture, and observe with what neat- 
ness her hoofs will just, and only just, clear 
the timber. In fact, the cow's traditional 
awkwardness chiefly appears when she is 
hampered by the handiwork of man. She 
will put her nose into a stanchion and then 
pretend she cannot withdraw it; she will get 
her head through a fence, work along to the 
other end of the panel, and affect to be hope- 
lessly imprisoned, so that the rail must be 
pulled out to release her. But when untram- 
meled, and moving slowly she shows all the 
grace that can be expected of a creature who 
has to bear in mind four feet, two stomachs, 
and a pair of horns. 

September 12. The rain crow sounded 
this morning, with usual results. He is hardly 
ever mistaken. I do not know whether he or 
the tree-toad is the surest prophet. Glow- 
worms are now most numerous, as are fire- 
flies in June. We have two varieties, one an 
unmistakable caterpillar, the other a kind of 
beetle with worm's tail, which I take to be 
the preliminary stage of the fire-fly. 

An ancient relation of mine was wont to 
observe about August first each year, ''After 
all, the summer does not last long". And it 
is true. Few are the days when no hour of 
the twenty-four is chilly, and you can lie on 



190 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

the ground without damp or stain; when the 
east wind is grateful, and life fills the air as 
the motes fill the sunbeam. When water is 
grateful to ear and eye, to skin and throat; 
when snow and ice are within the arctic cir- 
cle, and there are berries in Maine. When 
leaves lap one upon another, and young 
grasshoppers can yet be found; when the 
wasps are still enlarging their nests in the ap- 
ple-tree, and the rain comes in drops like the 
end of your thumb. With September the 
horses' coats begin to thicken, and the leaves 
to thin; the maize yellows, and the fall feed 
turns green. Poke-berries blacken, and 
grapes turn blue; corn-silk frizzles and cab- 
bage leaves dip up the dew. No longer is 
there possibility of gain or increase; we 
gather in the harvest we have made, and the 
utmost we can do is to save the crop. 

A belief in the permanence of things is 
perhaps necessary to their presentation with 
verisimilitude. Porte Crayon, a writer for 
Harper's fifty years ago, presents in his 
"Virginia Illustrated" a picture of Southern 
life in ante-bellum days, which is, or at any 
rate seems, far more truthful than Mrs. 
Stowe's lurid melodrama. She was much the 
more gifted and purposeful, but she intended 
and expected a cataclysm; whereas, for any 
hint of anticipation on Crayon's part, the 
war might have been distant a thousand 
years. His was the true antediluvian spirit. 
*'A11 things continue as they were" and this 
enabled him to write of slavery as if it were 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 191 

settled as the sunrlsing. While "Uncle Tom's 
Cabin" was exaggerated so well in propor- 
tion, as to harmonize to an outsider, yet even 
careful reading will show that there is exag- 
geration, and that only in that way could 
the immense effect it produced have been 
achieved. Crayon's little sketch, on the oth- 
er hand, moves on like one of the processes 
of nature; a small and retired process, to be 
sure, like the forming of an ant-hill, but none 
the less a vital growth, independent of tacks 
and paint. 

September /j. I know nothing equal to 
wild carrots for tripping one, especially 
when damp. If one moves with any rapid- 
ity, the flat heads lash round one's legs and 
catch together like hocks. And the stems 
and roots are too strong to break. 

The depth or distance to which roots will 
penetrate is much greater than appears to 
the eye. It has been demonstrated that the 
rootlets of grass and grain go more than 
four feet deep, though invisible. Alfalfa 
hath a strange alacrity in sinking, and will 
descend fifteen feet. The roots of trees will 
travel long distances to reach the water in 
drain pipes, entering at the joints, and com- 
pletely choking them up. I have taken a 
mass of apple-tree roots from such a posi- 
tion, six feet long by about two inches in di- 
ameter, fibrous, white, and soft, like a boa or 
comforter. Sometimes a kitchen drain will 
be completely enveloped by such roots, not 



192 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

entering the tile, but clinging closely to it on 
all sides, as if they were aware of the im- 
purity of the water, and wished it filtered. 
An old bone, or more frequently an old shoe, 
may often be seen pierced and traversed 
throughout by grass roots, forcing apart the 
layers of leather, filling the cells which once 
contained marrow. It is said that the roots 
of a yew tree have been known, after many 
years, to fill up, and take the exact shape of 
a body laid in the grave beneath. 

September 14. Found two Individuals 
picking up apples under a tree. Repeated 
shouts from a distance did not move them, 
and it was not till I got within conversational 
distance that they slowly started, eating as 
they left. "You seem uncommonly hard of 
hearing" said I. "I was only looking for an 
apple to eat" he replied. "Why should you 
eat apples which don't belong to you?" I 
asked. "Why, there's ever so many apples 
on the ground" said he. "Would you rath- 
er have 'em rot than somebody should eat 
'em?" "I observe you didn't take one of 
the rotten ones to eat," said I. "We go 
over them now and then, and pick out the 
good fruit". "Oh, excuse me," he replied 
with bitter irony, "I did not know I was do- 
ing you such an injury. But of course your 
privilege is to complain". He then passed 
on, apparently thinking the privilege was so 
great that no pecuniary compensation need 
be tendered. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 193 

September 75. Parties drove up this 
morning as we dug potatoes saying old Mr. 
P. had told them they could have a few 
ferns. I assented and they passed on. 
Hours later they emerged from the woods, 
their wagon so loaded down with rooted 
clumps of fern and brake that the springs 
went flat. Gebt nah, Gebt fern. 

The water lily seems to grow best at a 
depth of about three feet. I have noticed 
this in a pond, the water of which has been 
raised several times by increasing the height 
of the dam. On every such raise, the lilies 
disappear from their accustomed haunts, 
and show out further up stream. I can recol- 
lect one flat which was a fine meadow of red 
top grass thirty years ago now a mass of 
lily pads. Both the yellow and white varie- 
ties flourish here, but the former are of 
smaller size and rather unpleasant odor. 
Slightly brackish water does not seem to re- 
pel them; at least in one of the streams flow- 
ing into Barnegat Bay, where the tides affect 
the water level, they are thick and numer- 
ous. The lotus leaf seems to hold air, as the 
cabbage leaf water; on severing one freshly 
plucked many air bubbles can be seen on the 
lower side. This may or may not have some- 
thing to do with the assertion that by alter- 
nately puflling and sucking through the four 
holes traversing each stem, a well winded 
person can make the flower's petals open 
and close. I have never been able to do this 
myself, but there are those who claim it. 



194 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

September i6. The manner of the hus- 
bands of the (so called) lower classes 
towards their wives, and the manners of the 
wives of the (so called) upper classes 
toward their husbands are very similar. 

The extent to which egotism should enter 
into narration is a much mooted question. 
It, of course, varies with the distinction of 
the egotist. Byron or Rousseau could safe- 
ly venture on far more of it than a beginner. 
Perhaps, however, a safe general rule would 
be not to introduce the perpendicular pro- 
noun oftener than telegraph poles are set 
along a road. This is, on the average, about 
one to every hundred feet, fifty per mile. A 
mile has five thousand feet. For feet put 
words. Ten Fs to the thousand is one to 
the hundred, which is perhaps a safe limit, 
though often exceeded. Of course, if the 
Fs are considered as things in themselves 
beautiful, and not merely designed to carry 
the line of least resistance clear of obstruc- 
tions, the case is different. This impression 
existed, most likely, as respects a certain 
New England orator lost in the City 
of Churches, a certain Scotch tailor 
made over in Germany, and divers others. 
But there is always danger in setting your 
posts so thickly that they become a stock- 
ade, only serving to keep out the reader's 
attention from whatever better may exist be- 
yond. 

September ij. S. A doctrine is like a scar, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 195 

indicating the depth to which a heavenly 
message has penetrated human flesh. 

September 18. In Robin- Hood's barn the 
trees are the posts, the boughs are the raft- 
ers, the twigs are the laths, and the leaves 
are the shingles. 

A thatched roof Is almost never seen in 
America. The exceptions to this rule are 
mostly pig-sties and wagon-sheds, and those 
chiefly along shore. Yet thatch has many 
advantages. It is cheap, light, warm, and, 
when well laid, almost impenetrable by rain. 
Its defects are, perishability (it must be re- 
newed every five years or so) catching the 
wind, and, above all, Its inflammable nature. 
This unfits It for our dry, windy climate. In 
England it is sometimes soaked down during 
droughts, to lessen the danger of fire; and 
Howitt has described the whole population 
of a village turning out on a gusty afternoon, 
laying logs, barrows, harrows, and the like 
upon the roofs, lest they should take flight 
Into the fields. A thatched roof also furn- 
ishes an admirable harbor for rats, whence 
It is almost impossible to dislodge them. In 
the Shetland and Orkney Islands, the thatch 
was removed every year or so, and carted 
away to the fields, where, partly decayed 
and saturated with peat-smoke. It formed 
no Inconsiderable part of the available ma- 
nure. One recommendation of thatch must 
have been Its freedom from noise. It would 
take a terrible shower to wake the sleeper 



196 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

under a strawen roof; very different from 
shingles, not to speak of tin. 

September ig. Every year each tree gives 
a great pulse beat — the rising of the sap, 
one long breath — the spring of the leaf. Its 
lungs are all outside, like those of sundry 
batrachians, its fingers underground, like 
those of the mole. 

September 20. A recent writer (Fair- 
less) says that there is nothing on earth like 
the wheel — it was first found in heaven as 
Ezekiel saw it. This is perhaps true for 
if nature abhors a vacuum, she also abhors 
a circle. No perfect sphere or disk is found 
on earth. And even the great globe itself, 
is like the orange or cherry, flattened at the 
pole. 

Travel has been termed the fool's para- 
dise — probably because its blend of irre- 
sponsiblity and patronage peculiarly tickles 
the palate of the aforesaid. It was not al- 
ways thus. The old time traveler was like 
an arrow, going straight toward a mark, 
generally a religious shrine, Jerusalem or 
Mecca, and ignoring everything by the way; 
the modern is a sky-rocket, taking graceful 
curves, spending as he goes, and indistin- 
guishable at the end of his trip. He who 
returned with his life used to be thankful; 
now, he who does not bring back his money 
grumbles. Once, starvation was ever at 
one's elbow; now, the worst to be appre- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 197 

hended is a temporary shortage of cigar- 
ettes. Upon a time, an assassin or robber 
lurked in each thicket; now, the true Ameri- 
can visiting Paris must be warned not to 
strike a gendarme. Formerly, even a young 
man was not permitted to travel alone; now, 
two girls will dance off to Europe as for a 
waltz round a parlor. Time was when par- 
tially elderly persons were thought unequal 
to the fatigue and privation involved; now, 
those who have reached and passed the 
grand climacteric, rush off, only desirous to 
see the world before they can't. 

September 21. The quinces and Keiffer 
pears are becoming yellow and attractive. 
One year all the latter were stolen, one of 
the former had a narrow escape. I went 
that way at dusk to look for eggs, when I 
was aware of a man with a basket scram- 
bling through the fence and coming toward 
the quince bush. On seeing me he stopped, 
and walked round and round, looking on the 
ground as if he had dropped something. 
Having described several circles, he got 
back through the fence, again did the circling 
act, and then walked away. Each of us un- 
derstood the other perfectly, but neither 
spoke a word. 

The peddler is a man of uncertain privi- 
lege; he is licensed, but imperfectly protect- 
ed thereby. A farmer is assumed to have the 
right to sell his own produce to private pur- 
chasers without obtaining such license. This 



198 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

seems just, but of course it cuts into the bus- 
iness of the true peddler, who, in conse- 
quence, looks upon such farmers with no 
favoring eye, occasionally threatening young 
and timorous agriculturists with the law, or 
sternly demanding if they have no neigh- 
bor's produce aboard. As this may happen 
once in a long time without its being made a 
regular business, it naturally alarms the par- 
ty questioned, who does not thereafter feel 
confident of his right even to sell his own 
stuff, and seeks his customers with bated 
breath, and a careful eye for the policeman 
in the distance. This adds drawbacks to a 
business in itself by no means pleasant, for 
selling his produce is a farmer's hardest 
task. I had sooner raise an hundred bushels 
of corn, than take ten to town and sell them 
in open market. A grocer had always rath- 
er bid the farmer "get out and never come 
back" than reprove his clerk for giving too 
high a price. 

September 22. Finished digging early po- 
tatoes. Eighteen bushels from a half acre. 
A very poor crop as compared to neighbor 
R. who turns out one hundred and fifty to 
two hundred per acre. The severe drought 
or I should rather say, the small quantity of 
moisture, for what we had was well distrib- 
uted — may bear part of the blame. Also 
the patch occupied our poorer land. 

It will be remembered that one of the few 
things Herodotus could not believe was the 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 199 

tale of the Persian King who brought water 
for the use of his army through leathern 
pipes. That was the kind of hose used when 
I was young, unaltered since the days of 
Herodotus; but now rubber has driven It 
out. Irrigation, again, was wont to be prac- 
tised this many years by small ditches and 
trenches; but now the fluid Is conveyed 
through Iron pipes and rubber hose. It Is 
chiefly applied for celery, naturally an aqua- 
tic plant, which thrives In cool moist ground. 
In very dry weather small furrows are 
made, and the water allowed to run down 
them from the aforesaid pipes or hose, 
which, should the land slope the wrong way, 
are much In evidence, as the water has to be 
taken to the other end, and then permitted 
to run back. When the soil Is well soaked, 
dry earth Is pulled over It, to keep It from 
drying out until next morning, when the 
young plants are set out, about four Inches 
apart, and treated to another liquid dose a 
few days later, run In between the rows. 

September 2j. Before the wars of the 
Roses the king was a more powerful noble; 
after them the noble was a more powerful 
citizen. Before our Civil War, a master 
mechanic was a laborer who could give or- 
ders; since then a laborer Is a machine who 
can take orders. 

September 24. S. Saw on a log bunches 
of those long pale fungi known as "dead 



200 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

men's fingers". It lay in a damp and shady 
place, over a brook. Old lawyers are made 
judges as worn out files are made into cold 
chisels. 

Have figurative insults gone out? Many, 
once prevalent, seem to have become obso- 
lete, and some others have arisen to take 
their place. The fiche, or protrusion of the 
thumb, with the first and little fingers, (as 
against benediction, given with the first 
three digits extended) was supposed to ward 
oi^ the evil eye, at the same time conveying 
the damning imputation of witchcraft on the 
basis of defence being insult. In the same 
category would come many inelegant posi- 
tions of the hands and fingers, prevalent fifty 
or sixty years ago, as may be seen in the 
cartoons and caricatures of that period. The 
suggestion of a verdant stain upon fine rai- 
ment, the presentation of a rare marsh flow- 
er, were once pregnant sources of offense. 
Nor were mankind immune from other such 
practical innuendoes. Every one has heard 
of giving the mitten, though it now seems to 
have sunk away in dime novel metaphors. 
A whetstone was once the badge of a liar, a 
white clout at the coat-tail the sign of a cow- 
ard, or at least an intermeddler in household 
affairs which concerned him not; while the 
gift of a leather medal conveyed peculiar ig- 
nominy, and, perhaps longest lived of all, 
the scissors symbol still charges with redun- 
dancy of speech. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 201 

September 2^. Dug potatoes. Cool 
windy weather. The bunches of crab-grass 
are much in evidence, and have to be torn 
out to a considerable extent, entailing almost 
as much labor as lifting the potatoes. 

Crab-grass is a product of late summer, 
only second to the mushroom in rapidity of 
growth. You look over your potato or to- 
mato patch one day, and think how clean 
and well weeded it looks. Ensues a showery 
night. Next day a slight greenness is visible 
over the clods and cracks. And in what 
seems like only a few hours more, the crab- 
grass is upon you, rising like an exhalation, 
but by no means sinking in the same way. It 
grows in posture of seeming humility, but 
throws out rootlets at every joint, and soon 
it is so firmly established that only plowing 
will uproot it. You try to tear up a little of 
it with your hands from around some special 
plant; but the weak stems break at the joints 
leaving roots enough in the ground for twen- 
ty clumps. Even if, with a potato hook or 
hoe, you succeed in digging it out, an enor- 
mous mass of earth comes with it, leaving a 
hole beyond belief. Crab-grass will make a 
sort of hay, but it makes horses slobber, and 
gives men hay fever; at least the pollen from 
its fine purple panicles coincides with that 
complaint more than the blossoming of any 
other herb. 

Hay is, with us, chiefly made from timo- 
thy grass (said to derive its name from Tim- 
othy Hurd, who first brought it into general 



202 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

use) though clover mixed Is occasionally 
quoted In the city markets. Red-top, and oth- 
er such stuff, is mostly kept for home con- 
sumption. In England, the hay is much finer 
and shorter. To them our timothy hay ap- 
pears as if made from small rushes. In the 
Southern States hay makes but little figure, 
corn fodder being the chief reliance for their 
short winters. Such hay as I saw in Italy 
seemed to be made for the most part from 
some kind of annual summer grass, neither 
savory nor substantial; while the condition 
of the horses fed upon it was no recommen- 
dation of its excellence. Certainly, it seemed 
to agree with mules, but then thistles are 
said to agree with donkeys. Ten pounds of 
good hay per day, with a small ration of 
grain, will suffice for a horse; though much 
more is often fed. Say about two tons a 
year. At twenty dollars a ton, this would 
be forty for long fodder. Oats, one peck 
per day, at 40 cents per bushel, about as 
much more. Shoeing, and an occasional 
bunch of grass or ear of corn, would bring it 
up to about one hundred dollars per year, 
supposing everything had to be bought. At- 
tendance, as elsewhere stated, is supposed 
to be balanced by the manure; while it may 
be safely stated that, barring accident, a 
horse need never be sick. 

September 26. Finished digging late po- 
tatoes. Thirty-four bushels from half an 
acre. This is better than the earlier, but 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 203 

nothing to boast of. The land was in beets 
last year, and, though well manured, pro- 
duced a miserable crop. They were over 
run with crab-grass and smart-weed, which 
presumably took out all put in. 

The Blue Grass of Kentucky, and the 
Blue Grass of New Jersey are quite differ- 
ent. The first, of which every one has heard, 
is by no means peculiar to that state, but is 
found in a dozen others. Only in the "dark 
and bloody ground" it attains a vigor of 
growth and a depth of hue which have 
placed it at one remove from green, as the 
black-grass of the marshes has been set in 
another direction. The northern name of 
Blue Grass is "June Grass", a feathery- 
headed narrow bladed herb, forming the 
mainstay of ten thousand lawns, but the true 
blue grass (Poa compressa) is much rarer 
and slower of growth, generally appearing 
around old trees, posts and the like, its stalks 
thin, flattened, and really blue in color, its 
growth short and close, its roots so tough 
that many a mattock-blow is needed to cut 
them through. It is very nutritious, but so 
wiry that animals generally shun it after the 
seed-heads appear, while it makes but little 
figure as hay, the keenest scythe and the 
sharpest mower-knife often sliding over it. 
When once cut, it leaves a very white stub- 
ble, as the deep color of the upper stem 
pales an inch or two from the ground. 

September 2J. Ploughed the potato 



204 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

ground. While V. did this, I harrowed af- 
ter, with a basket on my arm, picking up 
those potatoes which had escaped the forks. 
They amounted to about a bushel in all. 
This is a kind of gleaning such as Moses's 
law would have forbidden to the owner in 
the days when there were hungry bodies 
about, ready to do it. 

When the maize (corn) is earing out in 
August it is most subject to injury from wind 
and rain combined. In June, or even in July, 
a cornfield may be laid almost flat without 
serious injury. Though apparently crushed 
as if by a roller, in two or three days it will 
rise up and straighten out in a remarkable 
manner, unless it has been battered by hail. 
But in August, despite the brace-roots, when 
the stalks are loaded with the heavy, if im- 
mature ears, if wind and rain come together 
the plant must fall, and fall like Lucifer, 
never to rise again. Not that this, of neces- 
sity, ruins the crop. I have more than once 
harvested very good yields of corn from a 
field which had been thus laid — the stalks 
fallen in all directions and in many layers, 
plaited, twisted, woven together like basket 
work, the tips of a few feebly curling up- 
ward, the ears soiled with sand and mud. 
But though the labor of harvesting such a 
crop is great, the quantity and quality of 
the grain seem little reduced. But the stalks 
make feeble stooks and mis-shapen bundles. 

September 28. Finished harrowing, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 205 

burned trash, and sowed by hand something 
over an acre of wheat. The surveyors, who 
for a space did fail, after running three lines 
through the woods, have been flitting about 
again the last day or two, and during the 
sowing I thought I heard them chopping in 
the woods. So, the wheat got in, I went on 
horseback to look them up. Presently I 
came on an oak tree In full leaf just felled 
more than fifty feet high, as I afterwards 
found by measurement, and two feet round. 
The sight transported me. All the dryads 
seemed to call aloud for help. I made a 
circuit, bore in the direction of voices, and 
found six or eight fellows sitting in a clump 
on the ground, just within our limits. I cir- 
cled round them like a barking hound, objur- 
gating and protesting. They said little to 
the purpose save to Inquire if they were on 
my land, and say that the company had or- 
dered a new course; and I said little to the 
purpose beyond threatening to pull up their 
sticks. After a heated interview we parted. 

September 2g. Drilled wheat in Farfield. 
Two troughs on the machine are filled, the 
one with fertilizer, the other with seed, 
which run down together through rubber 
tubes, and are deposited In little furrows, 
made by the share, of which one goes before 
each tube. The grass seed is contained In 
another little box, and gradually shaken on 
the earth through which the shares are about 
to pass. One drives, keeping a wheel of the 



2o6 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

drill always on the last share's track. The 
field is left, as Hardy says, resembling a 
piece of corduroy, save for here and there a 
tuft of oats, sprung from the grain scattered 
at harvest. A note from Mr. A. threaten- 
ing worse if I removed those stakes, which 
it seems are far more to be respected than 
trees twenty times their height. 

September jo. Finished driUing in Far- 
field. A constant eye must be kept on the 
various troughs on the drill, that neither 
seed nor fertilizer shall fail when we are 
away from the field edge, where the bags are 
piled. R. who is next to have the drill, came 
during the morning, anxiously inquiring if 
we were done. We finished at noon, and 
the index marked six and a half acres. 

Marl is known to most people only as the 
soil of the Inferno, and by them supposed 
to be an abbreviation of marble. So that 
when the Furies cried from the iron tower 
"Venga Medusa, e s'il farem di smalto" 
they only wished Dante to be converted into 
something a little harder than the surface he 
trod. But in reality it is a substance some- 
thing between sand, clay, and soft rock, with 
a large admixture of lime, sometimes crop- 
ping out to the surface, but generally found 
in deposits several feet deep, which was 
much in repute forty years ago for modify- 
ing and improving the barren sands of 
South Jersey. It was green in color, han- 
dled something like coal dust, and would 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 207 

smear a little when crushed. During the 
winter of 1870 I hauled ten tons of this 
from a place seven miles off, and put It in 
small heaps on grass land, spreading it in 
the spring. On the whole, the results were 
meagre. Grass was a little better where it 
was first heaped, but only a little ; and I think 
the money laid out in barnyard manure or 
guano, would have given better results. It 
has now sunk into oblivion as a top-dressing, 
along with its partner, muck; nor do I know 
of anyone who has used either for many 
years. 

Lime is another of the old-fashioned sup- 
posed enrichments of the land, whose use 
has not yet entirely died out, though rapidly 
passing. Many a load have I carted and 
spread, choking myself with the dust, crack- 
ing my shoes and finger-tips, and all to little 
purpose. A sturdy faith in its efficiency long 
prevailed, even when no results appeared; 
it must somehow do good, even if you could 
not see it. Gas-lime, which has been used 
as a purifier of illuminating gas, and turned 
green in the process, could be had very 
cheaply thirty years ago, and was much ap- 
plied by a German neighbor. It was gener- 
ally left in small heaps all winter, being 
thought to ''burn" the land, if spread at 
once ; and its pungent odor rises still in mem- 
ory. Plaster, so much had in regard by 
Franklin that he traced upon a field with it 
the words — "This was done with plaster," 
as an object-lesson to his neighbors, has been 



2o8 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

with me, yet more barren of result. A posi- 
tive friend used to say to me "You do a 
great deal of useless work", and methinks he 
was right, as regards the labor I expended 
on muck, marl, lime, and plaster. Only 
barn-yard manure and commercial fertilizers 
come back. 

October i. S. Perhaps the time may yet 
come when all human intercourse will be by 
intuitions and aspirations, and a spoken sen- 
tence will be as brutal as a blow. 

It has been asked why we should speak of 
the olden time, the days of old, etc., when 
really that was the youth of the world, and 
we are the gray-beard ancients, with the ex- 
perience and lore of the ages. But really 
antiquity is there, only just behind our backs. 
Paul Dombey was often termed old-fash- 
ioned; but this only meant that he had been 
brought up much — nay, chiefly — in the so- 
ciety of his parents and their contemporar- 
ies. Forty years back is a strange and un- 
known land — it is too close for us to reach, 
and but for the brave novehsts we would 
hardly know anything about it at all. We 
cannot focus our eyes on i860; the age of 
crinoline and peg-tops is further off than the 
age of the toga and the pallium. The time 
when "our grandfather was alive" is within 
the precincts of "yonder" which has been de- 
fined as out of call, but within sight. All the 
memories of survivors record the strange 
tongue they spoke, but Plato and Horace 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 209 

used the language all can understand, the 
mother-speech taught us pre-natally. 

October 2. V. rolled wheat field. I 
burned trash cut in August, and lying in 
soaked winrows ever since (some derive this 
from windrow, as if the crop were blown 
into lines by the wind; but wain-row seems 
more probable, the row along which the 
wain was driven to be loaded.) 

"The tanned haycock in the mead" says 
Milton; but while the epithet is true for a 
time, it does not long remain so. The cock, 
supposing it to remain long in situ, first 
changes from green to gray, then pales out, 
then, if exposed to many rains, turns black, 
and finally, after three or four weeks, turns 
pale again, and so remains, if left for a year. 
Corn stooks, on the other hand, after long 
remaining white, or nearly so, blacken In the 
succeeding year, and so remain among the 
new herbage. When passing through the 
Shenandoah Valley, in 1886, twenty years 
after the close of the Civil War, I was struck 
by the resemblance of the soldiers' ruined 
huts to old corn-stooks. They had been built 
of fence-rails, set up in cones, presumably 
fastened at the top by a withe, possibly wat- 
tled or woven In some way with bushes. All 
had fallen, most had decayed, but a few still 
remained, clear spots among the grass with a 
few butts of the biggest rails still radiating 
from a centre, to show where the heads of 
the invading army had been laid. Doubtless, 



2IO A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 
by this time, every hut has disappeared. 

October 3. Began cutting corn. No oth- 
er work done by hand makes such a show as 
this. A good man can cut an acre a day; and 
though he might mow as much grass, or cra- 
dle more grain, yet the corn, being ten or 
twelve feet high, bears a better showing. 
Several years back, I was engaged at this 
work when two strangers crossed the field. 
One of them, supposing me to be working by 
the job, stopped and inquired "How much 
d'ye get for this?" "Board and clothes", I 
replied. He stared a minute, then walked 
on. 

A cornstalk which has borne two good 
ears is worth very little, as a stalk; virtue 
has gone out of it. A barren stalk is limber 
and tough, and makes a capital binder. Fre- 
quently, one is found which has attempted 
too much, showing the beginnings of six or 
seven ears, but none brought to perfection. 
Never in my life have I seen a split or twin 
stalk, though there seems no reason why 
they should not appear occasionally, as twin 
leaves do. The ears sport more frequently 
being double, paged, headed, split, curled; 
and I have even seen them with a hole 
through the middle of the cob, admirably 
tending to drying. Shredded fodder is spok- 
en of latterly, but it is liable to mold and 
spoil, once the heart is broken into. By the 
way, when pith is such a poor and worthless 
thing, only fitted for toys, punk and padding. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 211 

why should it be considered laudatory to 
term an utterance pithy? And why, on re- 
verse, when sap is the life of the tree, and 
the most valuable thing about some trees and 
plants, why should "sappy" be a disparaging 
appellation? Again, "shucks" indicate ut- 
ter worthlessness, "husky" is thought rather 
fine. 

October 4. The corn is cut in square, gen- 
erally 7x7 though 6x8, 6x6^ and even 5x5 
are in use. The first block — 49 — leaves a 
central hill which is not severed from the 
earth and round which the rest are set up. 
This is the true meaning of the word 
"stook", namely, a bundle of grain in the 
straw held in one place by a few stalks still 
rooted. Maize and buck-wheat, as far as I 
know, are the only crops thus harvested. 
Both "shock" and "stack" are used for 
these bunches, but incorrectly. The first sig- 
nifies a number of sheaves — 12 to 20 — set 
up together. The other signifies a pile of 
loose fodder, in layers nearly or quite hori- 
zontal. It follows that Hood was technically 
wrong when he said of Ruth — 

"There she stood among the stooks". 

The feeble theory that "Comin' thro' the 
rye" had its origin in the passage of a small 
brook or stream of that name deserves no 
credence. First, a watercourse must be fitted 
out with a meaningless title, secondly, when 
so fitted it is no better place for kissing than 
any other. But rye was clearly selected be- 



212 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

cause it alone, of all grains known to the 
Scottish poet, grew tall and thick enough to 
conceal, or partially conceal, the forms of 
two lovers passing through it from observa- 
tion. Had he been acquainted with Indian 
corn, he might have chosen that. The cir- 
cumstance sometimes adduced for the brook 
theory, that one verse of the song reads, or 
might read — 

"Jenny is a'wat, puir body, 
Comin' thro' the rye." 
IS little to the purpose; for it is quite possible 
to get well soaked, in passing through a field 
of grain after rain or dew. 

"Twickenham Ferry" and good store of 
other songs may suffice for the partisans of 
water-courses; let us hold to the traditionary 
bright-haired lad and lass half seen, half hid- 
den among the tall bending stems of grain. 

October 5. Continued cutting corn. The 
stubs of the cut stalks show sharply over the 
cleared field, like old time calthrops. We 
had a youthful visitor here one day, who 
running carelessly through the field, fell and 
struck his forehead on one of these stubs, 
cutting an ugly gash. Rising, gory and vocal 
he declared he would kill every cat on the 
place. The feline race certainly was not re- 
sponsible for his downfall; but judgment is 
shown in proposing a scheme of vengeance 
within one's powers. 

Youth is like asparagus shoots; succulent 
and tender, all head, and easily crushed. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 213 

Why do we not have a noun to express the 
other extreme, without a qualifying adjec- 
tive? Could not something be done with 
''senectus?" Many words have been worse 
treated. The mediaevals set the coming of 
weary eld quite early. John of Gaunt, whom 
Shakespeare loads with epithets to express 
the degree of superannuation he had reached 
was barely fifty when he addressed all those 
admonitions to the luckless Richard. But 
the conditions of life were so hard in the 
Middle Ages that as soon as one's energies 
began to fail, down he went. Few are those 
who make a name beyond fifty. Marlbor- 
ough and Richardson are the most notable 
instances. The greatest oldest man of mod- 
ern times was undoubtedly Titian; that is, if 
we are to believe the legends concerning him, 
which, on the whole, is not a bad thing to do. 

October 6. Finished the three corner, and 
began on the main square of Longfield. 
Some of the corn on the old field we broke 
last spring, was very good, some very poor. 
There is a good deal of round-top (a weed 
with a tough, upright stem, four or five feet 
in height, leaves nearly circular) among the 
best of it, and many sassafras sprouts, al- 
ready gaudy with frost. The stick-tight, or 
beggar-weed, is also quite abundant, as yet 
innocuously green. A few warm, dry days 
will develop its importunities. 

Between insects, blights, fires, paper mak- 
ers, grading, telegraphs and asphalt, it 



214 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

seems probable that in a hundred years more 
there will be no trees left, only bushes and 
grass. They can stand a great deal, but not 
everything. One large hollow tree in our 
town, standing a little beyond the curb line, 
was preserved for many years by being filled 
in with brick and mortar. Another, left 
nearly two feet out of ground by the lower- 
ing of a sidewalk level thirty years ago, has 
accommodated itself to conditions and grown 
as many roots below its old ones as if water 
level had reflected them. On the other hand, 
two or three trees on another street were 
filled around at much the same date to a 
depth of three or four feet, and still survive, 
the former spring of their main branches 
now being just above ground. These last 
were maples, a tree which will stand more 
abuse than any other unless it be the ailan- 
thus. Often-times a tree, gnawed or other- 
wise barked half way around, will live for a 
long time on the strip of bark remaining, 
and sometimes grow a new stem, bowed to 
one side. Dogwoods will now and then, 
when bent to the earth for a long time, send 
out new roots from the twigs pressed into 
the soil, and may be, in time, would live by 
them. 

October 7. Continued cutting corn. The 
crop is in good shape, stands up well, has not 
been broken or tangled by storms, and the 
weather is fair and dry. Last season an 
early frost in September considerably in- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 215 

jured the fodder, and the stalks were crook- 
ed. One year the convolvulus, or bindweed, 
was so thick on the stalks that they heated in 
the stack, but very little of that weed ap- 
pears on Longfield. The maize plant is the 
only one remaining w^hich is still, on a large 
scale, planted, cut up and husked (its homo- 
logue for thrashing) by hand. Long has 
this prevailed, but machines are creeping in 
— cutting sleds, little Giant Mowers, etc. — 
and perhaps in twenty years more the corn 
knife and the husking-pin will be as obsolete 
as the sickle and the flail. 

Summer fallowing is another practice 
which has pretty well died out. It did very 
well when wheat was raised in a land where 
time and labor counted little, but manure 
was scarce, as in the Eastern States, and still 
more England, a hundred years ago. Then 
was the prosperous time of the farmer (not 
the laborer) any man ought to make money 
when wheat is five dollars a bushel, and he 
can get all the labor he wants at about fifty 
cents a day. Harris, an agricultural writer 
of 1870, had a good deal to say of fallow- 
ing, and it Is more frequently referred to by 
George Eliot than any other farm opera- 
tion. It was a good plan In its time, killing 
weeds, cleaning the ground; while there are 
many heavy soils which yield up their fer- 
tility, slowly but surely, by trituration alone, 
which grow rich (again to quote G. Eliot) 
by the negative process of spending nothing 
under the plow, harrow and roller. But a 



2i6 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

neglected fallow is worse than none, and 
the farmer must not be idle when the land is. 
Wheat has gone to the West and North, 
where, as yet, the land lives on its capital, 
hoed crops have taken the fallow's place, 
and a good sounding word passes away out 
of the language. 

October 8. S. They say fewer tears are 
shed in this world than of yore, but is there 
more laughter? I imagine decidedly less, of 
the sycophantic and adulatory kind. But 
there is surely more of it in speeches, politi- 
cal and social, and even in sermons. The 
laugh is also more in use to assert superiority 
and to cover embarrassment. By all the 
books, laborers used to laugh and sing, at 
their work, and over their ale. But one very 
seldom hears the former now, and almost 
never the latter. Drinking places, large and 
small, are generally silent as the grave. 

Cities form on straits just as people crowd 
in doorways. And as it may be observed that 
where an apartment has two doors it is al- 
ways the portal of egress which is crowded, 
so on lakes or seas the town is built where 
the stream leaves the lake, not where it en- 
ters. The upper end of Lake Leman is a 
scene of desolation — a great flat of silt and 
detritus, strewn with boulders large and 
small through which the Rhone winds its ob- 
structed way; but at the other end of the 
lake, where the Rhone leaves it, is the fair 
city of Geneva. The lake of the four Can- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 217 

tons has various inconsiderable villages 
along Its upper shores, but at its outlet is Lu- 
zern, held by some to be the most beautiful 
place In the world. So It Is with life. We 
make wonderfully little of the entrance door, 
all things considered; the recruiting station, 
though of utmost Interest to many, Is never 
crowded. But the passage of exit is so 
thronged that only one can pass out at a 
time; there are deposited monuments and 
obituaries, testaments and memories; did it 
depend on us, none would ever get through. 

October g. Getting up near the road, 
where the corn is at Its best. I remember 
Dr. N. spread a dozen loads or so of tobac- 
co stems on this part of the field. Saw C. go 
by on his one horse wagon, with a little jag 
of potatoes. More than thirty years ago he 
and his father used to go to and fro in the 
same way. They lived in town, but had a 
little farm to which they went nearly every 
day, and from which they always brought a 
trifling load — five or six bushels of potatoes, 
a dozen pumpkins, a little heap of corn, a 
few bunches of fodder — and on the front 
sat father and son, much alike, save that one 
was pale and grey-haired, the other rosy and 
red-haired. Now old C. has passed away, 
and young C. perhaps sixty, jogs to and fro 
as of yore. But no son sits beside him. 

Much curious lore lurks about the under- 
pinning of an old wagon; the long wheel- 
hubs, with a little notch in the outer band, to 



2i8 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

receive the long forgotten llnch-pin; the big 
wooden axles, which have stood wear and 
weather these sixty years, with the slim 
"skenes" above and below the arm for the 
wheel to turn on; the long, reach, sword, or 
disselboom connecting them; the king-bolt, 
passing through the langhead and front 
axle; the bolster where rests his majesty's 
crown, the tongue, long and slender beyond 
the ant-eaters; the hounds, perhaps most im- 
aginatively named of all the framework, a 
name given to the double brace, one on each 
side the tongue, as though, like hunting dogs, 
they sprang forward at once, seizing their 
prey. 

Each large city seems to have a convey- 
ance named after a suburb. London has its 
Hackney-coach, Philadelphia its German- 
town (a light covered wagon with a tail 
board which let down, but did not lock like 
a tail board unless you knew) New York its 
Rockaway. One of the former pleasures of 
travel was to see and try the vehicles pecu- 
liar to each place, but that has gone by now, 
the trolley car is swallowing them all. 

October lo. Finished cutting corn. Four 
hundred and fifty-four stooks from perhaps 
nine acres. The "Indian wigwams" as 
Trowbridge calls them, stand in even rows 
along and across the field, the better ones 
with dangling purses. The pumpkins, of 
which there were about a hundred, have been 
put under the stooks as we went, to hide them 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 219 

from pilferers, who lose all self-control at 
sight of the golden globes. The fence rows 
are full of loose tassels and blades, rusty 
Steinklrks and bilboes, cast away by the fall- 
en host. A sizable patch of Canada thistle, 
discovered near this end of the field, would 
cause me more perturbation if I did not 
know how little our soil favors that weed. 

Fall plowing seems an unnatural proceed- 
ing. Than plowing In spring nothing could 
be more in nature's course. The roll of the 
furrows goes with the rotation of the earth. 
In spring the ground is clear, the weeds have 
for the most part been frozen away, the sod 
is short, the animals do not remonstrate. 
Sometimes there Is a little too much mois- 
ture, but that is better than the reverse. In 
autumn, though the days grow short, they 
are at times quite sultry, the ground is hard 
and dry, the tall grass and weeds clog on the 
plow like seaweed on the stem of a boat; 
wasps and bees occasionally utter fierce re- 
monstrance, and above all, one knows that 
the crop to be sown will not mature until 
next year. Fall wheat and rye could never 
have been sown until great earthly faith and 
patience existed; the first man who raised 
winter wheat must have been in good prep- 
aration for the spiritual life. For every vir- 
tue must have its worldly foundation; the 
higher life begins with "rising from the 
earthen". 

October 11. Began picking winter apples. 



220 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

Smith's cider or WInesap (they seem much 
alike) and Nero. Many have already fall- 
en, and are too good to leave on the ground, 
but I know they will not keep well in store. 
The very best apples are on the highest and 
outmost boughs, and are reached with dif- 
ficulty, or have to be got down by shaking, 
which of course bruises them. Now and then 
we find one spiked on a stiff bit of stubble. 
Children frequently come and ask to be al- 
lowed to pick up a few on the ground, but 
as such permission generally results in their 
ascending the trees, and thrashing them with 
vehemence, we mostly refuse. 

The story is told of a man visiting a Food 
Exhibit, that, being urged to sample the 
goods, he picked up and ate in succession, 
at different tables, what he took for twelve 
caramels of strange flavor. His heart was 
almost too full for utterance when on taking 
up a circular, he read — "One of these tab- 
loids is equal to a full meal". Such might be 
the sensations of a student reading Bacon's 
Essays straight through. Many trashy nov- 
elists, on the other hand, are like carbonic 
acid gas, which though poisonous to the no- 
bler organs, may be taken into the stomach 
without harm. De Morgan resembles pota- 
to cake; wholesome and not unpalatable, but 
very filling. The same will apply, more or 
less, to the prose writings of Jean Ingelow, 
Smollett is like strong cheese, odor worse 
than taste. Du Maurier may be compared 
to absinthe, most tastefully disguised, and 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 221 

attractively put up. And how many writers, 
good in their way, have through their pages 
a gentle savor of hops. 

October 12. Wheat is breaking ground 
well, and among it may be seen on close 
scrutiny, the infantile and imitative grass. 
Scarcely is it up when the spiders stretch 
their Hnes from one point to another in the 
early morning. The place where a brush 
heap was burnt seven years back, the spot 
where a dunghill stood five years ago, is now 
distinct in the darker green of the more num- 
erous blades. Is this so much added to the 
field, or so much subtracted from the imme- 
diate vicinity of the aforesaid heap or hill? 

Forty, or nearly forty years ago, I was 
driving past the locomotive house in our 
good town, when I was hailed by a man look- 
ing like a broken engineer, who asked if I 
didn't want to buy some wood ashes. Be- 
lieving that the article was worth gold, I 
rushed home, wrung the money from a re- 
luctant parent (I can not remember the ex- 
act sum per bushel) loaded them into my 
wagon, took them home, and spread them on 
a meadow. I regret to say the results were 
scarce perceptible. Later on, when we had 
wood of our own to burn, I used to save the 
ashes, and apply them to potatoes in the 
spring; still without special effect. Have 
gradually settled down to the belief that 
while ashes are beneficial, it is only when ap- 
plied in large quantity, as the mass remain- 



222 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

ing from burning a pile of brush or weeds. 
This certainly shows; I know one place 
where a weed-heap was burnt seven years 
ago, and the difference In grass can be seen a 
quarter-mile off. Perhaps this Is partly the 
calcining of the earth; or perhaps, a still 
gloomier hypothesis, the soil around Is im- 
poverished In proportion. 

October /j. The nutters are becoming 
busy. We have one big chestnut, standing 
out in the field, which we try to reserve, put- 
ting signs upon it, and keeping as close watch 
as possible. Scores of others, in the woods, 
are abandoned to the public; but they want 
that too. Once I put up a notice, "All per- 
sons forbidden taking nuts here"." This was 
intended to prohibit picking fallen nuts from 
the ground, as well as beating them from the 
trees. Shortly after, seeing two youthful 
gatherers, I went and Inquired why they paid 
no attention to the sign. "We are making 
no noise" said they. "What has noise to do 
with It?" I asked. "The sign says 'AH 
persons forbid talking,' " they replied. 

On another occasion, I found two youth- 
ful nutters at this same tree, who fled at my 
approach. As they seemed to have collected 
a fat bag of nuts, I pursued. The fugitives 
at first kept to the open fields, where they 
could outfoot me, then, very unwisely, took 
to the woods. There the advantage was 
mine. I could smash through the bushes 
which they had to go round, so that capture 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 223 

and restitution soon ensued. I never so fully 
realized the statement of Burton, Gordon 
Gumming, et al., that a horse can beat a rhi- 
noceros in the open, but a rhinoceros can 
beat a horse in the jungle. 

October i^. Finished picking apples, 
about 25 bushels. This is the largest quanti- 
ty of winter apples we have had for several 
years. On the other farm we had the New- 
town pippin, a finer fruit and a better keeper 
than any we have here. I remember we once 
kept a dozen of them into June. 

The Ignis Fatuus, Jack-o'Lantern, Will-o' 
the Wisp, etc., never prevailed in this coun- 
try as in the Old World, where the eye rath- 
er than the ear was deluded. But I recollect 
one instance, occuring about 1835, being re- 
lated to me by an eye-witness, "It was a 
dark, cool, windy fall evening in Oswego, 
N. Y. About eight o'clock I was coming up 
to our house from the store, when I saw 
what I thought was a man with a lantern 
about a block away from me. But in a min- 
ute it was up at the next corner, quicker than 
any man could run. I then supposed it must 
be in a wagon, and went on home. Before 
I got into the house, it appeared again, and 
for nearly two hours flashed up and down 
the street, leaping three or four hundred 
feet in a second. No sound of any kind ac- 
companied It. At the nearest approach, per- 
haps two rods or so, it seemed like a ball of 
fire about as big as one's head, but of indis- 



224 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

tlnct outline. At times we would lose it for 
five or ten minutes, after which it would re- 
appear over the burying ground, some dis- 
tance off, and come darting toward us again. 
Once it entered the door of a deserted house 
opposite, and in a moment came out of the 
chimney, causing our 'help' to say she would 
not stay a night in that house for all the 
money in the world. About ten it vanished." 

October 75. S. The soul of goodness in 
things evil appears in what now seems the 
cruel old time treatment of suicides and il- 
legitimates. The object was not wanton 
atrocity, but the discouragement of self mur- 
der and unlawful unions. Jails and work- 
houses, too, were built for good purposes, 
though so much denounced. Perhaps the day 
will come when historians will tell how the 
emissaries of the State used to approach the 
helpless aged with money, and insult their 
wretchedness by offering them five shillings a 
week calling it "Old Age Pensions". 

Shakespeare's hard treatment of the Jew 
may have resulted from the fact that there 
were none in England in his time; from Wal- 
lace to Cromwell no Hebrew lived on Eng- 
lish soil. Thus the poet had to draw on a 
most fertile imagination; accurately describ- 
ing the archer's aim, but needlessly abasing 
the target. Creed was the cause of hatred 
then, as color is now. Gentlemen seem to 
have felt no way degraded by serving under 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 225 

Othello; but they despised and Insulted Shy- 
lock, a denizen of the same city. Just be- 
fore, and just after the Crusades, when 
''Whoever held or faith or honor dear 
Strove for the cause of Christ against Mah- 
moud", the Cid fought under Moslem ban- 
ners, and Charles V. made alliances with the 
Turks; in these days our gorge rises if a 
black man wins a prize-fight. Once we hated 
the Chinese because they worshipped a yel- 
low dragon; now we hate them because they 
have yellow skins. What reviler of the Mid- 
dle Ages ever termed his enemy a "nigger" ? 
What insulter of our own day ever calls his 
foe a miscreant? 

October 16. Began husking. We pulled 
down the stooks I lately set up with so much 
care, cutting the hill which anchored them to 
earth, drag two, three, or four of them to- 
gether, and pull them over sideways, break- 
ing the ears from their husks, and flinging 
them together into a heap. As yet the corn 
Is rather soft and damp, and it will not do to 
push on the work too rapidly, lest the ac- 
cumulated mass heat In the crib. One bushel 
to the stook is a fair crop, one and a half 
good, two, very good. The bereaved stalks 
are bound with straw or twine In bundles 
about large enough to go under one's arm, 
and set up In shocks to cure still more. 

October ly. Beautiful, calm, hazy day. 
Gossamer flying In flakes and long strings 



226 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

over the fields. Thoreau says it is called in 
Germany "the Hying summer" as though that 
season tore to fragments and visibly blew 
away. Sometimes by looking up with one's 
hat held against the sun one can see the air 
filled, high as a hawk fiics, with the glisten- 
ing streaks, like a dry snow storm. 

The kingfisher of our waters is not a bird 
of specially noticeable plumage, chiefly re- 
markable for his crest, long bill, and tail con- 
spicuous by its absence. As he always car- 
ries the captive fish in his beak, instead of his 
claws, as does the fish hawk, one would sup- 
pose that a tail would be needed to balance 
the weight; but evidently such is not the case, 
I have never seen him either in high air, or 
diving in water, but always flying low, and 
generally in shadow under a steep bank, in 
which, presumably, the nest is made. The 
king-bird or pewee, only resembling the king- 
fisher in his crest, has a further reason of 
name in his dauntless courage. He will at- 
tack a crow, five or six times larger than him- 
self and drive him clean out of sight, darting 
down upon him at intervals, and plucking a 
feather from his head or back, while the 
larger bird thinks only of escape. The king- 
bird also shows great alimentary daring, hov- 
ering around bee-hives and swallowing the 
occupants as they come and go, a proceeding 
which seems but one remove from feeding on 
coals of fire, or bits of glass. 

October i8. Rain, which gossamer days 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 227 

often precede, held up our husking today, 
and threw us on getting in wood and straw. 
Man suffers less from weather than his 
crops, goods, clothes, tools, or weapons. And 
the few things dampness does not injure are 
susceptible to dryness. Peas, paint brushes, 
boots, pumps, boats, are spoiled by drought. 
The Spring undoubtedly suggested the 
Naiad, i hat water should How or fall down- 
ward is nothing extraordinary; but that it 
should rise strongly upward is such an ap- 
parent act of life that It must needs be per- 
sonified. A spring's repellant power is won- 
derful. Fresh, or at least fair, water can be 
had within a stone's throw of the Atlantic 
ocean. Arethusa rose from the bottom of 
the Mediterranean, and I have heard of a 
spring in a salt meadow, covered with brine 
at high, tide, but pouring forth sweet water 
at the ebb. Cooper, in the "Crater" repre- 
sents a brook as flowing from the top of an 
isolated peak in the sea, and though this is 
difficult of belief, the springs found on the 
small Islands of the Pacific must of necessity 
be on the tops of submerged mountains. 
When I was a boy, one might occasionally 
see at country places small wooden pumps 
which had not, nor needed handles, pouring 
forth a ceaseless stream, the product of a 
spring which had been conducted through 
hollowed logs. These were termed pen- 
stocks. Whence the name? Did the Hin- 
doo "pane" and the Saxon "stick" here join 
hands? 



228 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

Bridges on the farm, such at least as are 
intended for the passage of teams and wag- 
ons, are apt to be very unpicturesque. Step- 
ping stones, or a plank with handrail, are 
easily made to look fairly well; but anything 
larger soon settles into a mere dam, which 
chokes the current when there is one, and 
looks needless when there is not. To begin 
with, it is very difficult to hold up the banks 
of a small stream, so that they will not crush 
down under the sleepers. The natural way 
out of this difficulty is to make a box sluice. 
But this is incredibly hard to construct of 
logs, whole or split; boards are too frail, and 
one falls on the planks taken from old stable 
floors. A sluice having been made of these, 
logs and brush are laid above it, and earth 
piled on. But such a way, though it may 
serve until the sluice chokes, altogether lacks 
that clean severance of its parts from the 
passing fluid which is essential to the grace 
of all aquatic constructions. Bridges are fre- 
quent subjects with the artist; but they must 
be real bridges, not half floating logs or 
swing-ferries. Boats of all kinds have ever 
been admired; but no painter that I can recol- 
lect has ever represented a raft, unless it 
were a mere stage to bear the survivors of 
the Meduse, or a single castaway. The wat- 
erlogged can never be attractive. 

October ig. Husked again in morning. 
About noon it began to rain again. We kept 
on for a little while, covering the heaps of 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 229 

corn with stalks as we went but soon had to 
get the wagon, load them in, covering with a 
rubber sheet as much as possible, and cart 
away to the corn crib. By the time we had 
got it stowed, two handlings had pretty much 
jarred the moisture from the ears. It takes 
a very heavy rain, or actual submersion to 
soak the oily kernels. 

Found a rat's tail in a crack of one of the 
doors, high up near the top. It had been 
freshly pulled out by the roots, for some ten- 
dons still hung to it. Could not account for its 
presence. It was not tightly jammed in the 
crack, for a light pull withdrew it. The own- 
er would have had no trouble at all in get- 
ting it out, as it would have tapered from 
him. Had a cat, or other enemy of rodents 
done it, the marks of teeth or claws would 
have shown upon it. A terrible pull must 
have been needed for its abstraction. These 
animals not only devour the grain and meal, 
but cut up bags, carriage cushions, and the 
like for their nests, and are almost impossi- 
ble to dislodge. They never go afield, as do 
the mice, being seldom seen far from the 
barns, though one would suppose them bet- 
ter equipped for travel and defence. Their 
boring and burrowing capacities are well 
known. A rat is said to have gnawed off the 
corner of a brick to make his tunnel, and 
they will often eat through sticks which they 
might, with less apparent toil, have pushed 
aside or gone around. But probably their 
incessant state of teething necessitates con- 



230 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

stant gnawing for its relief. 

October 20. Rain again, no husking, so 
shifted hay from the door end of the cow 
barn, where it was first pitched in, to the 
dark end almost unattainable by a wagon, to 
make room for the corn stalks which will 
soon be brought in. This cow barn is an an- 
cient affair, perhaps eighty years old, built on 
posts not one of which probably remains 
sound at foot. So the whole concern stands 
like a box on the earth, every year wasting a 
little more on the lower edge, like a horse's 
hoof. Of course, this leads to uneven set- 
tling and cracking, but it may last twenty 
years yet, unless a mighty wind arises. As 
Carlyle says of the Ancient Regime "It is 
surprising how long the rotten will last, if 
you don't shake it". 

Tethering of cows was first and is oftenest 
practised in the Isle of Jersey, because there 
the fields are small and the grass is rich. It 
is evident that where ten acres are necessary 
for the sustenance of a beast, it would starve 
on a twenty-foot tether. But when grass is 
so thick and strong that moving the stake 
a yard, so that the cow does not even tread it 
with her fore feet, will suffice to give her a 
half day's feed, that equality of supply and 
demand is presented which must ever glad- 
den an economist's soul. And three or four 
cows thus staked out, each cutting down a 
crescent strip, have much the effect of a com- 
pany of mowers, in slow but certain progress. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 231 

There Is also no occasion for fences on this 
plan, and scarcely a blade goes to waste. On 
the other hand, the cows must be quiet ones. 
A vicious animal, or even one unused to such 
restraint, will cause much trouble, pull- 
ing out her stake, twisting the rope or chain 
Into kinks, or getting the line round her hind 
foot, and then backing away until she Is 
thrown. Very wet or very dry weather are 
likewise unfavorable to this system. In the 
former, the sod is badly trampled and cut up, 
in the latter, the stakes are very hard to 
drive. 

October 21. Readers of *'Selborne" will 
remember the countenance therein given to 
the legend of swallows spending the winter 
at the bottom of a pond. But I have seen, 
and probably White saw, what looked very 
like it. At about this time of year, I think in 
1882, I was in a boat on the pond and saw a 
large compact flock of swallows, probably 
sixty or seventy, whirling, crossing, chatter- 
ing, and much on the alert. Every now and 
then one would leave the throng which hov- 
ered about twenty feet from the surface, 
dash down like a fish hawk diving, strike the 
water, and apparently sink below It. Of 
course if he did it must have been for a mo- 
ment only, of course his loud descent must 
have covered his silent rising, of course it is 
a long way from this to pulling them out In 
masses like frog spawn in spring, but it bore 
a color. 



232 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

October 22. S. First frost. Tomatoes, 
beans, nasturtiums, corn, (where any re- 
mains uncut) wilted down. The same with 
bindweed, round-top, campion, mallows. 
Chickweed, wild onion, docks, stand up still. 
The black-birds (as noted in "Lorna 
Doone") look large in the morning. On the 
whole, this is rather late for first frost. It 
averages early in October. Last year we had 
one in September, whitening the corn stalks 
before they were cut, but that was unusual. 

What is called a gravel-pit in England is 
called a sand-hole here. We have one in the 
woods, suddenly come upon, a space of light 
and air, yet curiously dark when you get into 
it. The bark of the forest roots surrounding 
it (for roots have bark) hangs its black 
flaccid strings down the yellow sugary sides 
of the hole, deprived of the sinew which once 
filled them. Close by runs a little brook, and 
the hole is bottomed with shaly rock, proba- 
bly just above water level. Most of the grav- 
el varies from brown to yellow, in streaks 
and shades like a well-grown beard, but now 
and then occur pockets of black grit, resemb- 
ling finely ground charcoal. The sand-mar- 
tin should build here, but that fowl I have 
never seen. Occasionally when we dig gravel 
in winter, the long tailed mouse will roll 
from his hibernation, ruffling his yellow vest, 
rubbing his white ears with gray paws, and 
feebly protesting against being wakened. A 
small cedar at one side which has bent to the 
cutting away of the soil, straightened up. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 233 

bent again to the ice storm, and again 
straightened, lives by two slender roots, and 
furnishes a noble example of perseverance 
against fortune. 

October 2j. Husking again. The condi- 
tion of the husks varies greatly. Some are 
utterly dry, curled and shrivelled away from 
the ear they once covered. Some are just 
a little parted at the end, showing the tip. 
Some still sheath it tenaciously, lapping the 
spindle-shaped ear like a mackerel's scale, 
each shuck sharply turned up at the point. 
And some are still in a mesh of green about 
the milky stain, red and yellow silk yet in 
evidence. 

October 2^. A few break from the stalk 
unsought, most of them husk easily, but now 
and then one seems almost as strong as the 
human wrist, and requires great effort to de- 
tach it. A fairly good ear has 700 to 900 
kernels; fourteen rows, about sixty to the 
row. An extra good ear may have a hun- 
dred kernels to the row, and count up 1500 
grains or over. 

The king in chess is like a mediaeval mon- 
arch who was a good swordsman, personally 
had no head for affairs, and possessed an im- 
perious wife — say Henry VI. When an en- 
emy comes within arm's length, he can strike 
him down; but has no grasp of complex 
threads. And yet his life is very precious, 
and on him depends the army's fate. So 



234 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

long as Henry was at large, his party made 
head with varying success; when he was 
checked In the Tower, all was over. His 
queen, energetic as she was, became negligi- 
ble when Isolated. Robert Burton, erudite, 
desiccate, elaborate, desultory — that Is, If 
the desultor ever leaped from one elephant 
to another — belonged. In many ways, to the 
Dark Ages. His life was In books; yet every 
one knows how his occasional recreation was 
to walk down to the river and hear the bar- 
gees wrangle; just as mathematicians find re- 
lief from their dry mental labors in antic 
gambols and hand springs. Two persons 
could hardly be more unlike than Burton and 
Ovid; yet there can be little doubt that If the 
English scholar had not done it, the Latin 
poet could have written a very complete Ana- 
toml of Melancholy. 

October 2^. The corn on Farfield last 
year was much exposed to pilferers, and I 
expected depredations at roasting ear time. 
I do not think there were very many; but of 
one I found traces, when the crop was cut. 
He had evidently gone into the thickest part 
of the field where he would not be observed 
pulled a dozen or more ears, got down on his 
knees, rolled the ^'tucket" in paper, and car- 
ried It off. The number of ears he took could 
readily be counted on the surrounding stalks, 
the print of both knees was to be seen in the 
clay soil, and he had left one sheet of paper 
behind. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 235 

Pirates were probably in their glory about 
the time the first steamer was built which 
was to sweep them from the seas; just as 
stage coaches had reached their greatest ex- 
cellence when the first dirty blundering loco- 
motive came on the scene, and as clipper 
ships made their swiftest voyages when the 
paddle wheels had been a few years churning 
the Atlantic. There never were finer swords- 
men than in the years succeeding the discov- 
ery of gun-powder, or more pleasure riders 
than when the motor-car burst upon us. The 
long bow was never better than when the vile 
guns began to be used, or plate armor finer 
than when it would protect no more. When 
Watt observed the lid of the tea-kettle clat- 
ter, and Fulton put the tea-kettle in a boat, 
probably neither ever thought that he was 
dealing a deadly blow at piracy, but with the 
steamer came equality of speed, and the 
necessity for procuring commercial fuel in a 
business-like way. Gone were the days when 
it was only necessary to heave down once a 
year or so in some lonely island, scrape the 
bottom, fill water-casks and off again; and 
the last Christian and gentlemanly pirate is 
said to have died in 1861. 

October 26. Nutters are becoming quite 
numerous, and as the corn-field is not in 
sight, they have things much their own way. 
The big hollow chestnut tree, twenty feet in 
circumference, their special point of attack, 
has been twice set on fire, the first time, a 



236 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

good many years ago, by an Idle boy. The 
flames got a start on that occasion, and It 
was several hours before I could extinguish 
them by banking up the hole in the tree with 
earth. The other time It was done by some 
fellows who said they wanted to see what 
was inside. 

October 27. The full-blown gunner does 
not yet appear, but men with dogs now and 
then pass along the roads, and hie the 
hounds Into fields that look promising, be- 
coming violently abusive when bidden to de- 
sist. Unconsciously to themselves, they 
probably feel that they combine Squire Wes- 
tern and Robin Hood; though they quite 
lack either the position of the one or the 
picturesqueness of the other. 

Macaulay holds that the pastoral races 
are best fitted for war, the agricultural next, 
the mechanic townsman least. Certainly the 
farmer Is used to weather, enduring of toil, 
handy at expedients; but some say that in 
our Civil War the city men did best. How- 
ever, this may have been because one so sel- 
dom sees a young man on a farm. Black- 
stone defines a yeoman as one who pays for- 
ty shillings rent annually; and Chaucer's 
"yeoman" were all in readiness for battle. 
They trained down, or up, into the yeo- 
manry KIngsley describes as putting down 
the rioters in "Alton Locke"; but apparently 
neither of them went out of the country. Con- 
scripts for domestic strife, volunteers for 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 237 

foreign service. Probably the greatest wars 
have been those engaged In by the fewest 
persons. The ceaseless and fruitless strife 
of the Highland clans was like the grinding 
of the pebbles on a beach; the great cam- 
paigns of conquest or defense like a few 
stones projected from a catapult. Marathon 
was won by a mere handful; the Paraguayan 
contests, wherein children of ten or twelve 
took part, never accomplished anything. 

October 28. The beggar-weed Is now get- 
ting dry and brown and Its pronged seeds 
part readily from the boll. One's sleeves 
and legs are fringed with them. (Why is 
there not some name for the lower part of 
trousers or the upper part of stockings in- 
stead of the weak designation "legs", which 
belongs to the limbs they cover?) 

Stone breaking is of modern date. The 
ancients cut stones, built them up, laid them 
down, turned them round, everything, ap- 
parently, except breaking them up small. 
That was left for us. Macadam's discovery, 
that broken stone would pack, set thousands 
of hammers going. Everyone knows how he 
thought the stones must all be of like size, 
how the laborers were provided with 2J/2 
Inch rings for measurement, how the loss of 
the rings resulted in their putting the stones 
in their mouths, and how one laborer sur- 
passed all the others until It was found he 
had no teeth. It was long before the stone 
road gained favor in this country; one's sub- 



238 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

stitutes were the corduroy and the plank. The 
first probably combined the minimum of la- 
bor (for the builder) with the maximum of 
discomfort (for the traveller) the latter, 
though perishable, were comfortable. I 
have seen an old wooden bridge where the 
heavier planks were laid crosswise, as usual, 
and then covered with light lengthway 
boards. Passage over this was exquisitely 
luxurious, like travelling on air; or at least it 
seemed so before the days of pneumatic tires. 
Perhaps the nadir of odopoesm was reached 
in 1870, when, as I have been told by a resi- 
dent, the roads out of Chicago were made of 
stable manure, which endured about six 
weeks. 

October 2g. S. The second frost has fallen. 
In the calm morning the leaves drop cease- 
lessly from the cherry trees, and the switches 
from the coffee tree, ticking on the branches 
as they come through them, and forming a 
carpet all around the stem, as large as the 
spread of the boughs. 

''Come caduno le foglie, 
L'uno sul altro, quando oramo 
Rende alia terra tutte le sue spoglle, 
Similimente il mal seme d'Adamo". 

The union of a man and horse makes a 
horseman, the union of a man and a spear a 
spearman, etc., the less always preceding 
and qualifying the greater. Why then, should 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 239 

not the union of soul and body make a body- 
soul? Would that be equivalent to an in- 
dividuality? And if so, was it merely the 
Emperor Hadrian's individuality which ad- 
dressed "Animula, vagula, blandula" a per- 
sonality which would cease with animula's 
flight, the three becoming two again? The 
Scripture seems to countenance this "What 
shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" 
As if the soul were something different and 
separate from the man, even more under his 
control than the body. Hadrian did not ask 
what would become of his body; he knew 
that very well; but it was not he. ''He" 
would only have been in a position to make 
the inquiry before the separation. After, he 
the personating, would only have been like 
an aeronaut clinging to that perishable para- 
chute, the body, which must of necessity soon 
come to earth, and watching the balloon, An- 
imula sail away into the clouds, he knew not 
where. 

October jo. The tide comes up to the 
dam of Weston's pond, only about half a 
mile from this place; and perhaps before the 
dam was built, at very high spring tides, the 
rise may have been felt even as far as our 
woods. No one within reach of these salty 
fingers can call himself land-locked. 

Andrea del Sarto said that a man's reach 
should exceed his grasp — the moderns say 
"don't bite off more than you can chaw", 
which is right? Perhaps they might both be 



240 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

combined Into the statement that a man's 
reach should exceed the grasp of things on 
him. A man's occupation should Immerge 
him, but never submerge; he ought to stand 
head and shoulders above It, distinctively the 
man, however trifling, he, however, great his 
profession. Herbert was not the mere par- 
son, or Curran the mere lawyer, or Holmes 
the mere doctor, or Hans Sachs the mere 
cobbler. These were all literary men, you 
say, by that alone distinguished? Turn It 
about; Cervantes, and Sidney, and Dr. John- 
son were not mere men of letters. The role 
of the dissolving lump of sugar unbefits any 
man; on him may that most fatal judgment 
be passed, "He Is very well In his way" show- 
ing that his way has consumed him, like the 
snail. Better gather on your path, like the 
snowball, or, to reverse the metaphor, be 
like the quassia cup, which will give a hun- 
dred draughts without dilution or diminu- 
tion. 

October j/. In driving through the coun- 
try thirty years ago, at this season, the thun- 
der of flails could be constantly heard on the 
air, now loudly, then faintly as If the storms 
of summer had retreated to a last hiding 
place In the barns and were growling out 
their time of Imprisonment. That sound has 
echoed through the autumn for thousands of 
years, but In all probability It will never be 
heard again; the machine has done for it. 

November i. Began ploughing the corn 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 241 

stubble. Husking is not yet over, but that 
can be done on frozen ground, and plough- 
ing cannot. We have cleared the stalks from 
the three corner, and V. began there today. 
"The farmer meaning to have spring again," 
as Miss Austin says. 

A man came to buy some stalks, drawing 
them himself from the field. As this saves 
carting them in, we sell them under such cir- 
cumstances, for two cents a bundle. He ar- 
rived about ten a. m. with a one-horse wag- 
on, and his wife to help him load (they were 
Germans, it is needless to say) and about 
eleven had them on. The load was too much 
for the horse in the field, and two of us went 
down to help along. With persuasive 
thwacks and hard pushing the wagon was 
got nearly out of the field, when the horse 
ran one of the deep-sunk wheels against a 
corn butt, and there stuck. Shovels were 
then procured, the butt, and several others in 
line, dug away, and another start made. This 
brought the wagon to our front fence, where 
not taking the opening squarely enough, it 
stuck between the tall gate posts. More 
struggles ensued, but the wagon could not be 
got through till half the load was thrown 
off. He and his wife came back for it later, 
and gathered all up to the last shred, even 
making up the loose blades into little bundles 
and pushing them under the load. Great is 
German thrift. 

November 2. Still at the husking. We 



242 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

are well up the field now, In the poorest of 
the crop. The stooks turn out little more 
than half a bushel apiece, and the stalks 
amount to but two bunches apiece. This is 
the land that had tumbled down to red-top, 
the poorest of all sods to turn under. 

A dry Fall is not only disastrous, but un- 
natural. It seems as if Nature ought to have 
her face well washed before she went to 
sleep. Winter, too, always appears to hang 
back until there has been considerable pre- 
cipitation, and, unpleasant as he is, one 
wishes to have him get at work. The leaf 
that falls by drought ere it is time for it to 
fall by frost never seems to have had its 
chance. It is incongruous to see the bed of a 
stream frozen before there is water enough 
to come down it. Dust flying from Decem- 
ber roads seems much more noisome 
than dust in June; and dust on ice or snow is 
most inharmonious of all. One goes crash- 
ing noisily through the woods over the dry 
leaves, and all the tree stems look white in- 
stead of black. The fence posts stand forth 
bleakly, and the splintered rail ends sing in 
the wind. The crows are blown from their 
course, and the belated grasshopper or toad 
looks dusty. Sounds are less than they should 
be, and views are greater. The wheat stands 
up in little yellow spires, and the grass be- 
tween it is almost invisible. Moss can scarce- 
ly be found, and mould Is not found at all. 
The well chains have to be lengthened, and 
the cistern goes dry. The gunners start fires, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 243 

and the clouds have no edges. 

November 5. The sweetness of the maize 
sap is well known. In the well-dried state, 
this remains as a slight sugary taste through- 
out. Where the corn is cut too soon, or 
stowed away too green, it generally moulds. 
But now and then one finds a stalk in the 
mow with a decided alcoholic flavor. It has 
been cut green, and its situation has been just 
warm enough for fermentation, just dry 
enough for preservation. 

Great is the distress of the farmer who 
has to buy anything he might have raised. 
Purchase of salt he does not mind at all; 
that of sugar touches him a little, for honey 
might be his, and maple sap. Flour and meat 
are worse, vegetables and fruits still worse; 
grain for stock, very bad; hay, well nigh in- 
tolerable. It is many and many a year since 
I had to buy hay; but well do I remember 
the mortification accompanying. In nearly 
forty years we have only had to buy milk for 
about four months, say, one eightieth of the 
time. The man who can raise everything, 
literally, that he uses — food, clothes, shelter, 
fencing, tools — must be happy indeed; per- 
haps not so his wife. Next to this came the 
actual rustic of a hundred years back, who 
really raised all he needed except a little iron, 
a little salt, sugar, and tea, and an occasional 
suit of store clothes. From him we come 
slowly down to the present-day farmer, who 
is constantly being solicited to buy more, and 



244 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

more, and more, and finds that he can sell 
less, and less, and less, either through fail- 
ure of soil, crops, or market. Of course this 
does not make him happy; while his wife 
should be so, but is not, as long as he Is a 
farmer at all. 

November 4. Found a fire stone in the 
field today. Slightly larger than an egg, but 
of oblong shape, it just fits the left hand, 
and on the lower side is a hole about an inch 
deep the size of one's finger. How many 
times dusky palms may have held this on the 
upper end of a stick, revolving the latter 
with a bow and bearing heavily down, until 
sparks leaped from the lower end, and once 
more fire was born into the world. 

Everyone has his "Choir Invisible." To 
some it is a trumpet call; to som€ a lullaby, 
to some a threatening discord. The student 
has one, and the soldier, and the sailor. The 
saint has his army of martyrs; the statesman, 
Hampden and Washington. Sometimes it 
calls us on, anon it warns us back. It may 
incite us to heroic effort, or lay on us burdens 
far beyond our capacities. Happy is he who 
can listen to it with discretion, not enchanted, 
or bewildered, or flattered, or cast down. 
Sometimes it were best to stop one's ears; 
not all can distinguish between the ancient 
and modern siren. It may be the anvil chor- 
us, and agree best with work; it may only 
combine with calm and leisure. In youth it 
is before us; in maturity, above, in old age, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 245 

behind. He who survives to fourscore may 
hear the contemporaries of his youth cry to 
him from the fiftieth milestone "What hast 
thou done with thy thirty years beyond uj 
who fell by the way?" 

November 5. S. Perhaps female stenog- 
raphers are sometimes engaged on the same 
principle by which Louis XI used to choose 
his councillors from low born men; they 
were little likely to become rivals. 

Haggard tells a tale of a lady, who, being 
on his farm at the time of wheat harvest, 
asked what he did with the wheat. "We 
make it Into bread", said he. "Do you mean 
to say", she exclaimed, "that it is made of 
those little hard things? I always thought 
bread was made out of that dust you see in 
flowers", by which, probably, she meant the 
pollen. "It Is but fair to say", adds Hag- 
gard, "that of late she repudiates the tale 
in toto". It Is not long since, being at the 
seaside, I heard an aquatic speech which 
might match this agricultural one. The bath- 
ing ropes had just been braced into position, 
and, at the outer end were already tangled 
with seaweed. A lady guest was expressing 
her dissatisfaction with this state of things. 
"I don't see," said she, "why they didn't put 
the slimy weedy part up here, and the dry 
part out in the water". 

Another, getting aboard a boat, dropped 
her overshoe Into the water. "Did it sink", 
asked some one. "I don't know", said she. 



246 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

"Is it heavy things or Hght things that sink?" 

November 6. A rainy morning held up 
husking again. Shifted more hay and 
ploughed. The corn butts are a great obsta- 
cle to this; one the English farmer never 
dreamed of. Now and then the plough hits 
a clump so fairly as to split and scatter it; 
but many of them remain like three-legged 
stools half buried in the earth. I have 
known small farmers who spent much time 
harrowing, beating out, and carting away 
the corn butts. No doubt, however, this re- 
moves a good deal of vegetable humus. 

Steering a plow is very like steering a 
boat. The tyro holds stilts or tiller with 
both hands, heaving the tool right and left, 
yawing the boat painfully; the adept can do 
It with finger and thumb. Shaving a stone or 
stump so closely as to break the ribbon of 
sod without touching the obstacle it encircles 
is analogous to dragging the drift from a 
channel-stake in water. The stones are like 
waves when beating up to the wind; you can 
stand one, a second will generally throw you 
out. Splitting a corn butt in your way is good 
practice, and so is running down a floating 
apple or bottle. Throwing the long strip of 
grass, five inches by five hundred feet, which 
remains on finishing a dead furrow — send- 
ing this all over, cleanly inverted, without 
once losing the plow's grip on it or the earth 
from which you tear it, resembles squeezing 
a close hauled boat by a point. Landside is 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 247 

center-board, mold-board Is wale-streak. 
And as it is possible, at the last, to send the 
boat by under a pilot's luff — that is, to throw 
her up in the wind and make the last few 
yards under headway, so may the plowman, 
at the furrow-end, when his team is pulling 
hopelessly round to the left, throw his plow 
flat on landside and toss the end of sod al- 
most into the air, yet lay it in place. 

November 7. Got another man, husked 
with great energy, and turned out fifty-one 
bushels e^ars. The work is now telling on 
our hands, which are badly scored and 
cracked. Hamlin Garland has much to say 
of this and other sufferings of the farmer. I 
know no one who writes so understandingly 
and bitterly of agricultural labor. 

He speaks of carrying pails of water from 
the well, staggering beneath the load and 
splashing one's feet, as if it was like the 
water torture; of the cracking of one's hands 
mentioned above, as resembling the thumb- 
screw; and one would suppose that only the 
rack was comparable to the binding and 
pitching of grain. 

The farmer is not alone in his necessity 
for hard manual labor; and If all men re- 
garded labor as Garland seems to do, the 
earth would be an Inferno. The Ebal of 
toil Is always balanced In this world by the 
Gerlzim of Its reward — repose, If nothing 
more. But, Garland, following Scripture it 
must be admitted, sits always in Ebal; and 



248 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

his fulmlnations therefrom are lamentable 
to hear. He gives the Impression of a fee- 
ble, sickly boy, who for years had been driv- 
en to uncongenial and unpaid toil by blows 
and threats, and had escaped therefrom as 
soon as he was able. He never makes mis- 
takes in his bucolic descriptions ; but he lacks 
that breadth and geniality which might cause 
even mistakes to be endured. 

November 8. Finished husking. The 
last few stocks were very large, and the corn 
being shucked in great haste, and, flung at 
random on the ground, was hard to find and 
gather up in the dark. Indeed, some had to 
be left till next day. Four hundred and six- 
ty-two bushels of ears (soft and hard) is not 
a very good crop, but the best that field has 
borne for many a year. A little over a bush- 
el to the stook. 

The crawfish or crayfish is a small white 
lobster found in the bed of gravelly streams 
or springs, for he does not affect deep or 
swift water. The newt is the next step up- 
ward from him to drought, the frog the next 
step downward. His jaws, though diminu- 
tive, are so exactly In shape like those of his 
big brother of the ocean that even the slight 
pinch they give inspires terror. What he 
feeds upon I know not; his sole desire, ap- 
parently, to bury himself deeper, and yet 
deeper in the gravel. The bull-frog I have 
twice or thrice seen, but he is not abundant. 
One spring, in opening out a drain, I threw 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 249 

out two bull-frogs and a snake. The rat, 
muskrat, mouse, mole and toad are also fond 
of these underground habitations, which are 
probably of very equal temperature, though 
subject to great variations as respects dry- 
ness and dampness. Still, when the onrush 
of water comes with the falling rain, some of 
these gentry are capable of withstanding it 
so resolutely as not only to stop the flood; 
but cause the water to burst out of the earth 
where they abide, and run along on the top 
of the ground. 

November g. Carted in stalks. On the 
whole they are in very good condition, well 
cured; and not so dry as to break up like 
brush. I have seen the amazing statement 
in an old British Encyclopaedia, that in 
America corn stalks are sometimes made in- 
to fences, a use for which they are as little 
fitted as anything possibly could be. Though 
the stalk is so strong and sturdy for the time, 
it has none of the qualities of the bamboo, 
and soon breaks up when exposed to weather. 
The encyclopaedia responsible for this state- 
ment also gave what purported to be a pic- 
ture of the maize plant, showing a large 
plump ear growing on the top of the stalk, 
like a head of wheat, as if the thin last joint 
of maize would be able to hold it up for a 
moment. The artist probably drew the ear 
of corn from life, but neglected to discover 
what position it took on the stalk, and could 
think of no other than the one he represent- 



250 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

ed. I do not know that I ever saw so glar- 
ing a mistake. Cornstalks would not even 
do to weave into the hurdle, so much used 
in England. It has been said that whatever 
grows in a summer will rot in a winter; but 
perhaps reeds and rushes are the stoutest an- 
nuals. When not cut or burnt off, they may 
be seen standing the second summer, and 
sometimes the third, among the new growth. 
Pokeweed and asparagus stems are also 
quite durable, in their ways. Still, frost and 
warmth succeeding will do for almost any- 
thing. 

November lO. Finished getting in stalks. 
The gunning season begins to-day, and in 
spite of abundant notices, two squirrels were 
shot in our door yard. 

How feeble were the savage weapons ! 
The arrow-heads seem as if they could never 
hurt, unless they hit you in the face; the 
stone axes, as if they would cut down the 
tree no sooner than a hammer; the spears, as 
if a thick coat would stop them. I once broke 
an axe at the eye, leaving only the bright 
thin lower part of the blade, and I could not 
but think what a treasure this would have 
been to any Mohawk or Huron of ye olden 
time; how he would have treasured and ad- 
mired, perhaps even worshipped the keen 
shining bit of steel with which he could, on 
occasion, cut his finger, in which he could, on 
occasion, see his face; how the fame of it 
would have spread abroad among his foes, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 251 

and plots would be laid to deprive him of it. 
Most natives have done best, and first, with 
their weapons of war; in these they shone, 
while the tools of peace languished. But 
the aborigine of this country has left us two 
legacies, the birch canoe and the snowshoe, 
both peaceful, while all his warlike furni- 
ture is utterly inadequate. 

November 11. Pulled beets yesterday, 
and carrots today. The former were a very 
small crop. Since we have adopted the prac- 
tise of twisting off the tops by hand, instead 
of cutting them off with knives, they have 
kept a great deal better, scarcely lost a bush- 
el last year. 

Harvesting beets is work that can be done 
very rapidly. In about four hours, another 
man and myself pulled and piled 75 bushels 
of beets. They have also to be covered with 
the green tops as far as they will go, supple- 
mented by weeds and grass, and then after a 
few days' sweating, conveyed into the cellar. 
The biggest beet we ever had was two feet 
long and about as much around, and weighed 
near fifteen pounds. Two like this would fill 
a basket; but of course there are not many 
such. The carrots are hard to get out. Un- 
less the ground is unusually soft, they cannot 
be pulled singly by the tops, and must be 
helped out with a fork, which is slow and 
dirty work. Parsnips are hardest of all, as 
they grow on a level with, or almost beneath 
the ground, and about half of them is gen- 



252 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

erally left behind. With the housing of the 
roots and the stalks, Summer, for farm 
work, ends, and silver dollars must console 
one for golden suns. One looks forward to 
the cessation of labor, at least of urgent and 
imperative labor; but when it comes, the 
weather Is too sharp to enjoy it. 

November 12. S. By whom were the 
world's four great poems written? A blind 
beggar, a banished mayor, a prosperous ac- 
tor, a German privy-councillor. And none of 
these poets were great travellers. Homer 
could hardly have got much beyond the Gre- 
cian archipelago, possibly to Sicily and Asia 
Minor. Dante is thought to have been in 
England, certainly in France; but spent most 
of his life In Northern Italy. Shakespeare 
was never, so far as appears, out of England. 
Goethe only saw Germany and Italy. Yet 
these four would compare most favorably 
with Longfellow, with his two years' Euro- 
pean travel; Browning and Landor, with 
their long sojourns in Italy and Spain, and 
Lowell, the foreign minister. Their gallops 
round the rim of their brains are better than 
the ride to Khiva; they circumnavigated the 
world before Magellan, and discovered 
more than Columbus. Which ever way they 
led was the van; truth was theirs, if not ver- 
acity and wisdom, if not knowledge. They 
climbed towers which showed all the king- 
doms of the world. Weimar was higher than 
Eiffel, Smyrna than the Pyramids. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 253 

November /j. Gunners this morning 
shot a rabbit close to K's house, and then 
went down along the edge of our place, send- 
ing the dogs in to start up game. When I ob- 
jected to this they inquired if I was lookin' 
for trouble, and assured me that I had only 
lived on the place a year. Earlier in the day 
I heard two shots near W.'s barn, and then 
a voice, articulate though afar, crying "Gim- 
me that rabbit; I say, gimme that rabbit". 

Someone, Reade, I think has said of the 
agricultural laborer that if, at the end of his 
life, all the work he has done were put into 
one heap, and all the pay he had received for 
it put into another, the former would be im- 
mense, the latter pitifully small. Probably 
this is more or less the case with all farming 
receipts — 25 to 50 cents a day, for the 300 
working days of the year, is as much as can 
be expected. Of course one has one's living, 
or a part of It, besides: milk, eggs, vegeta- 
bles, fruit, a little meat, also one lives on the 
place. But then come in Interest and taxes, 
in those days enormous. On the whole, per- 
haps it was never Intended that any money 
should be made out of farming; Indeed, the 
farmer, if you push him home, was original- 
ly an intermediary, a middleman, an exploit- 
er; farming of taxes shows this. The true 
man of earth Is the Bauer, the peasant; he It 
Is, or was, if he has not perished, who got 
his clothes, his food, his drink, his shelter, 
his all, from the soil; who paid taxes in kind, 
who never had a coin, or a care, or a 



254 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

thought; who knew 

"Nought loftier than the village spire, 
Nought mightier than the village squire". 

November i^. Sharply cold, causing 
fears for the potatoes In barn. I got some of 
them In, and the weather moderated In after- 
noon. I know nothing that gives one, agri- 
culturally, such a sense of wasted oppor- 
tunities as a sudden frost before vegetables 
are housed. 

The crust of frozen earth Is the callous 
formed by Winter's attrition. Our delicate 
sense of touch with the great mother Is 
blunted when that has formed. You can dig 
no worms thereafter. Edible roots break 
off In It, unedlble hold It down. Above Is the 
^'wrinkled clod as hard as brick"; below, the 
kindly brown soil. The first colonists, when 
they had occasion to bury their dead In froz- 
en soil, were constrained to cut a hole In the 
crust with their swords, and then pry up the 
earth slabs with boughs before they could 
open the grave. I have seen children build 
houses and walls of slabs thus set up; but 
they collapsed under the rising sun almost as 
quickly, and much more filthily, than the 
snow Igloo. The crust will rise around and 
above all but the smallest stones, leaving 
them loose but unattainable, moving In their 
hollow like a joint In Its socket, but impossi- 
ble to pick up. Later on, when the frost 
goes deep, the stones rise with It. Seven de- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 255 

grees below freezing point, as a rule, will en- 
rind the earth so as to put a stop to plowing; 
above that the plates can be pushed aside. 

November 75. Drew several loads of 
stone from an old heap. The lower ones 
quite sink in the ground, as if the earth had 
grown up among them. I suppose this comes 
partly from the weight of the heap sinking 
the lower ones when the ground is soft, but 
more from dust and leaves, settling in the 
cracks of the mass, gradually forming mold. 

One of the ways in which a farmer could 
turn an honest penny thirty years ago, was 
by gathering up the "hard-heads" or small 
boulders — mostly about the size of a child's 
head — from off his fields in time of leisure, 
depositing them in convenient heaps, and 
then selling them to the town to pave the 
streets thereof. As our town Is mostly built 
on the red shale, containing no round stone, 
and as many farms within a mile or two con- 
tain abundance of such stone. It was a clear 
case of demand and supply; and many a 
quarter has many a farmer pocketed for half 
a day's picking up and carting; while it Is not 
impossible that he might at times have recog- 
nized one of his own native stones embedded 
in the town street. But time went on, the 
city became too fine for cobblestones; Bel- 
gian block, asphaltum, brick, reared their 
horrid heads. "Spend the money, don't be 
mean", was the motto; the old stonen ways 
were torn up, and their components cast, lit- 



256 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

erally, to the moles and the bats; and soon 
he who would see how cobblestones looked 
must go to the old pictures. 

November i6. ''While as I walked 
abroad upon the field 

To see the ploughman turn the heavy leaves 
Of that dark book which summer lately 
writ". 

Macbeth is of all the great dramatists' 
characters the one whose development most 
interests. This has two causes — one being 
that the play covers a longer time than the 
average — the other, that, almost alone of 
Shakespeare's dramas, it contains no love 
story, merely a record of crimes prompted 
by ambition, and the ambition of a childless 
pair at that. All the world loves a lover, 
though with unrequited affection; and one 
cause, among many, of Shakespeare's popu- 
larity may be the extraordinary high quality 
of his lovers. Many a writer has drawn 
charming girls who could not construct fit 
mates for them. But gentle William's men 
are, if anything finer than his heroines. Of 
course, they vary. Bertram is mean and 
faithless; Claudio cowardly; Petruchio a tri- 
fle coarse. But Ferdinand and Lorenzo have 
a grand flow of language, while Romeo, Ben- 
edick, Valentine, Orlando, Demetrius, are 
suitors of whom any girl might be proud. 
Cordelia's partner measures up well in the 
little we see of him, while Hamlet, though 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 257 

rough and arrogant of language, had natur- 
ally a fine nature and a pretty wit, and was 
constrained, by the heavy task he thought 
laid on him, to use forcible expressions in 
order to sustain his madness — or his sanity. 
There may be observed in Tennyson's 
lovers a great disinclination to come to the 
point, and a desire to throw the burden on 
the lady. Such is the line for a "Princess" 
to follow, perhaps; but Maud's lover (name 
not given) after a vague scene in the rosy 
west, instead of calling manfully on her, 
idles about the garden, waiting for her to 
come his way. Walter gets the Talking Oak 
to blab everything he has heard Olivia say, 
until he feels secure enough to arrange about 
her wedding ornaments. "Cousin" in Loch- 
sley Hall, (name not given again) holds the 
following language : — 

"Then I said 'My cousin Amy, speak, and 
speak the truth to me : 
Trust me, cousin, all the current of my be- 
ing turns to thee' ". 

On which Amy utters an avowal clear and 
impassioned as heart could wish. Even the 
Lord of Burleigh, untrammeled by inferior- 
ity of rank, like some of the gentlemen men- 
tioned above, must needs whisper gaily in 
her ear — 

"Maiden, I have watched thee daily. 
And I think thou lovest me well". 



258 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

On hearing which assertion, the maiden re- 
turns a reply very Hke Amy's. Certainly the 
plan seems to have worked well; but as cer- 
tainly Tennyson's enamored youth lack fire. 

November ij. Getting pumpkins in cel- 
lar. These last feel the frost more than any 
other crop, collapsing under it like mush- 
rooms. It is curious to see them in the field 
during October, how the dark green they 
wear in September changes, first in spots and 
streaks, then in a uniform yellow glory, like 
summer following spring over the globe. 
Pursued two gunners on the wheat-field, who 
fled incontinently. 

While the horse, and every other animal 
with perhaps one exception, has various gaits, 
to suit various degrees of speed, man and 
his works have but one. The biped's run is 
but a fast walk; his walk a slow run. The 
skip, the hop, the jump, are but brief vari- 
ants and can never be kept up for any length 
of time. Perhaps dancing is but an attempt 
on our part to imitate the rhythmic grace of 
the quadruped's bounds. The oar, the screw, 
the paddle, the wheel, can only move faster 
or slower; they cannot alter the manner of 
their stroke or revolution, the sole excep- 
tion made, perhaps, of a sailor sculling a 
boat with a single oar over the stern. The 
exception among animals, noted above, is 
the elephant. His gait has been described 
as neither a walk, trot, nor gallop, but a sort 
of shuffle, increased or diminished in rapidity 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 259 

according to circumstances. As Kipling says 
"If an elephant wished to catch a railway 
train, he could not gallop, but he could catch 
the train". Thus does man's latest invention 
join hands with the sole surivor of the ante- 
diluvian monsters; for the automobile also 
cannot gallop, but it can catch a train. 

The wild horse has two natural gaits; the 
gallop and the walk. The canter is a slow 
gallop, the "rack" a fast walk. The trot is 
a purely artificial or perhaps one should 
rather say, artful, mode of progress, never 
indulged in by the untamed horse, seldom 
even by the tamed one, when at liberty. In 
this alone has the mare surpassed the horse, 
as a woman can surpass a man at dancing. All 
the other records of speed and endurance 
have been made by stallions. The "rack" 
is a step with the two feet on the same side 
at the same time, and very awkward to view 
head on. A racker, coming directly toward 
you, looks as if he would tear himself to 
pieces. Yet It cannot be as distressing as It 
looks, for the racker has beaten the trotter. 
It Is also undesirable for a saddler. One 
can rise to the trot, but not to the rack. But 
It so much resembles in appearance the pace, 
amble, single-foot, etc., that a racker Is fre- 
quently opined to be a good riding animal. 
Another reason for supposing this gait to be 
an easy one for the beast, though not for 
man, is that old horses who can do It at all 
fall more and more into the habit with ad- 
vancing years, as though It combined better 



26o A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

with stiff muscles and shaky joints. 

November i8. Turned out horse radish 
for K. This is hard work on man and team. 
One drives, another holds, and the horses 
have to stop and breathe at the end of each 
row. The roots burst before the share with 
a noise almost like cleaving wood and, 
turned out high on one side, have to be at 
once dragged away, to make room for the 
next furrow. 

How slight a thing may make the differ- 
ence between an unblemished and a tarn- 
ished record. Nearly forty years ago, I was 
in our town near the police station, when a 
man passed along with a load of turnips — 
swedes, or rutabagas, perhaps twenty bush- 
els in the load. He was followed by a crowd 
of urchins, hanging on the back of his wag- 
on, and crying "Mister, gimme a turnip; 
gimme a turnip!" Becoming irritated by 
their clamor, he at length turned, snatched 
up one of the roots, and flung it with great 
force into the crowd of boys. The turnip 
did not strike any of them, but rebounded 
from the pavement, and flew upward at the 
station window. A look of horror crossed 
the faces of both man and boys as they 
watched its course. Full on the window it 
struck, but, luckily, on the sash-bar, not on 
the glass. It fell back, and was picked up 
in a moment. No notice was taken by the 
"ever vigilant," and the farmer drove on, 
evidently much relieved. The smallest dif- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 261 

ference In the course of the projectile would 
have smashed the window, and most likely 
caused his arrest; and whereas his record 
has ever since been a good one, that might to 
him have been the beginning of a political 
career. 

November ig. S. Walking In woods, 
found a stone bridge which I made over a 
brook some years ago — sides of heavy bould- 
ers, roadway of small and broken stone, — 
had been pried up and scattered with a rail, 
presumably by marauders In search of game. 

A dun Is a town. First signifying a hill of 
varying size, from the diminutive sand-dune 
to the greact swelling Downs, the name soon 
merged Into that of the dwelling, or group 
of dwellings generally placed on a hill. And 
without absolutely certifying to the etymo- 
logical accuracy, of all the words concerned, 
it is curious that almost every noun In the 
language, and some other languages, formed 
of those four letters, vowels along being 
changed, and their derivatives, signifies eith- 
er giving or receiving, like cup and ball, gen- 
erally violently. Dun, or dune, as above 
stated, is a hill; Don Is a prominent noble; 
din is a rising and assailing sound. On the 
other hand, a den is a hollow place, as 
though made by the Impact of the dune. A 
dent, or dint, Is a smaller recession In a hard 
surface, produced by a blow, don't Is one of 
the most shrewd nobby words in the lan- 
guage; done belongs to the closing of a bar- 



262 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

gain, by the party given in, or taken in. 
Dunt is Scotch for the nich in a place above 
mentioned; dent is French for tooth, as- 
suredly a hard and prominent object; to 
daunt, or dant (O. E.) is to terrify into with- 
drawal; lastly, though down, the noun, sig- 
nifies a rising, down, the preposition, signi- 
fies exactly the reverse. 

November 20. Continued ploughing. 
Scattered a party of seven gunners, crossing 
the fields in defiance of all signs. Some of 
them turned back at my call, others kept on. 
Another recent trespasser, on being halted, 
inquired generally "What kind of a fellow 
that was, who would not let a man who 
worked in a factory all the week go out to 
shoot a rabbit?" This gentleman, and others 
like-minded with him, would do well to re- 
member that those same factories bear signs 
"No admittance except on business," and 
that the stranger who should stroll through 
them, appropriating any trifles that pleased 
his fancy, would be thrown out in short or- 
der. 

Many years ago, on a fair June evening, 
when the days were at their clearest and 
longest, I saw a small white cloud suddenly 
appear in the west just after the sun went 
down. It was two or three times the sun's 
apparent diameter and came out on the sky 
in an instant, like the puff of smoke produced 
by the explosion of a shell. There was no 
sound audible, either at its appearance, or 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 263 

afterward. It endured about ten minutes, 
and then slowly faded out. By night, it would 
undoubtedly have been a magnificent meteor 
perhaps even an hour later. 

Frost does not "fall" on cloudy nights. 
The cloud acts like a blanket, and keeps the 
earth warm. And yet the frost itself is like 
a blanket, and a tree, a house, a bush, a pile 
of wood, even a few posts, will keep it up 
from the earth as if it hung bagging between 
them, and thus kept from crushing the low 
and tender vegetables. Weeds will keep it 
oft the grass, and grass will keep it off the 
ground, and hair will keep it from an ani- 
mal's hide, and a beard will keep it from 
one's face. The frost must be very severe 
for these last defenses to show as defenses, 
but I have seen and felt it. One may even 
sweat beneath and freeze without, at once. 

November 21. Legal reference to the ap- 
proaching trolley lately caused me to liken 
the two farms, one on each side the highway, 
to Rachel and Leah. The former and fair- 
er, to the south; the latter and stronger, to 
the north. And we can well imagine Jacob, 
if in danger of losing Rachel, through the 
might of some irresistible potentate, trying 
to turn his mind from thoughts of her beau- 
ty and grace to contemplation of Leah's 
solid worth. 

"Men and women", one says, "have prob- 
ably looked much the same to each other in 
all periods". This may be doubted. Did an 



264 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

Australian "gin" or a Dakota squaw look to 
her male contemporaries as Mrs. Langtry 
looked to her male contemporaries? Do all 
persons see all other persons of different sex 
on the same level with them exactly alike? 
Do fashions, and manners, and customs, and 
faiths make no difference? Do our hands 
clasp like Mark Antony's, and has only the 
glove's fashion changed? Men and women 
know very little about each other; Granted; 
but does knowledge of this kind never in- 
crease? The little they do know Is the most 
Important and interesting thing in the world. 
Granted again; but can that knowledge nev- 
er be handed on? Is it all experience, and 
not learning? Is such knowledge the eternal 
and ceaseless circle whose only end Is found 
in going through it, and calling it a wedding 
ring? 

Some answer to all these questions was 
perhaps attained by the artist who could 
paint you a nude figure for every epoch, 
which seemed as if it should be clad In the 
garments of that epoch. 

"Should a man marry?" To which Mon- 
taigne replies — "If a young man, not yet, — 
if an old man, never". 

Montaigne was like a drum, in that he 
uttered many things both sound and strik- 
ing; perhaps this was one of them. The only 
chance for wedlock, under these conditions, 
would seem to be that none but middle-aged 
men should marry. And perhaps the happi- 
ness of the race would be Increased, and the 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 265 

race of happiness shortened if marriage 
were only permitted to men between thirty 
and fifty. Foolish children would be set 
aside, cruel parents largely eliminated; an- 
cient sires kept from folly; lawful heirs 
strongly fortified. Perhaps the tide would 
flow deeper and swifter, like the Mississippi 
at New Orleans between the Eads jetties, 
simply because it was confined, and not al- 
lowed to waste itself on any young Delta 
Phi, or any old Theta Iota Nu Gamma. For, 
of course, such restrictions could never ap- 
ply to women; they would all marry, as they 
do now, while young and fair, and be happy 
with their mature, stalwart and sensible 
spouses. 

November 22. Getting apples into cellar. 
These will bear harder frost than any fruit 
or vegetable, unless it be onions, and even 
when frozen do not undergo such displeas- 
ing changes as potatoes. 

Time, as has been observed, is of little 
value to the New Zealand savage, who will 
spend six months or so in covering a war- 
club or a paddle with elaborate patterns, his 
tool a bit of shell. It is of hardly more val- 
ue to the ecstatic saint, who looked to anoth- 
er world for rules, action, and reward. But 
between them lay the great Mount of 
Achievement, which we spend our lives in al- 
ternately building up and striving to scale; 
where he who adds a hod of gravel is almost 
as much honored as he who sets gay foot 



i66 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

thereon; where tasks the savage never 
dreamed of are proposed and toils the saint 
ignores are undertaken. To increase, to 
make coherent, to ascend this mountain of 
shding sand. Time and Ambition ahke fail 
us. Sad it is, when, almost conquering the 
ridge, we see that one step more will place 
us, not on the top, but on the hopeless down- 
ward slope; but we are to remember that 
while few men do all they meant to do, every 
man does all he was meant to do. 

November 2j. About this time, many 
years ago, we had a number of young pullets 
and one or two hens, roosting in the ever- 
green near which they had been hatched. 
One night a dog made a clamorous attack, 
and, I think, caught one of them. The next 
evening, as they took up their line of march 
for the tree, I noticed, following in their 
wake, a dejected and unwilling looking cock. 
In some way, they had made him aware of 
their peril, and persuaded him to act as their 
defender. And as such he remained with 
them until a week later they were all driven 
to the hen house. 

Probably at the bottom of every man's 
mind is the conviction that all women belong 
to him — as slaves, drudges, ministrants, 
mirth-makers, elevators, guardian angels, ac- 
cording to position, character, and tempera- 
ment. Of course, unless he is a fool, he does 
not say so — if he is a decent man, he does 
not act upon it; if he is a wise man, he is not 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 267 

moved by It; If he Is a good man, he strives 
against It. But the conviction remains. He 
can pay no woman a greater compliment 
than to ask her to marry him; that Is, to be 
his guide and blessing for life; but It Is he 
who Is to be guided and blessed. When he 
hears of another's marriage, he vaguely feels 
that he has acted rather handsomely, and 
that had he put forth all his powers the oth- 
er fellow would never have got her. Mis- 
fortune and failure will severely crop and 
prune this Idea, but not eradicate It; age will 
dry, but not kill It. If, perchance, he finds a 
woman decidedly superior and unmistakably 
Indifferent, he need never look far to find 
another so much the contrary that he has 
only to strike an average and be happy again. 
And If, by some extraordinary concatenation 
of causes, or unwonted feebleness of fibre; 
the notion Is fairly beaten out of him, he will 
be condemned of all men, most of all women 
— and deserve It. 

The word "people" Is dear to the heart of 
woman; she Is the exception who does not 
mostly use It to signify her own sex, even 
though the popular action under discussion 
may be the wearing of plumes or the adjust- 
ment of pins. While perhaps she would not 
say In so many words "We are the people, 
and wisdom shall die with us", she has a 
comfortable conviction that such Is the case. 
"Other people" means, with her, the richest 
half dozen women of her acquaintance. Men 
are things apart; portents and cranks; trou- 



268 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

blous creatures, who have somehow got into 
their hands a great deal more power than is 
good for them. You often hear a woman say 
"I wish I were a man", you never hear a 
woman say "I wish to be a man". What she 
wants is, not to exchange her individuahty 
for his, but to join her individuahty to his 
potentialities; a thing impossible. In Miss 
Austen's time, "the gentlemen" were like the 
thunder-cloud looming on the horizon; 
fraught with mighty possibilities. Now, "the 
men" are like electric poles standing in the 
midst, undeniably tall and strong, still chan- 
nels of power, but shorn of much awe and 
some capacity. 

November 24. The grass blades begin to 
turn yellow along the edges, the wheat to lie 
flat on the earth. All green leaves are down 
now, except a very few apples. Only the 
tenacious oaks hold part of their robes till 
spring. 

Everyone, and the childless man soonest, 
comes to the place where he must exchange 
emotion for philosophy. A child is an em- 
bodied emotion. True, it is not long before 
other emotions enter in and dwell there, and 
the infant entity resents invasion, but it at 
least prolongs the dwelling among pleasant 
verdancies by several years. Nor can the 
infant entity be blamed. Emotion is a neces- 
sity to the young and a pleasure to the old; 
philosophy, vice versa. A youth often 
thinks and says with the younger brother in 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 269 

Comus, "How charming Is divine philoso- 
phy I" The old man says, and knows, "Give 
me philosophy, or I perish". To a young 
man emotion is the vital air, which he 
breathes without much thinking about It; to 
the old man it is like hydrogen gas, which 
may fill him pretty bubbles, may even take 
him off his feet, if there is enough of it, but 
which to Inhale were his destruction. There, 
are, of course, exceptions in both cases, nor 
can the boundary line be laid down with any 
certainty; but it may pretty safely be as- 
serted that the youth who Is really — not sup- 
erficially and hypocritically — a philosopher, 
will never come to good; for he, more than 
any other. Is liable to merge Into that hope- 
less laughing-stock, the emotional old man. 

November 25. Very mild and summer- 
like. Grubbing up a little copse of beeches. 
"The Man with the Hoe", is much pitied; 
but I am fond of the tool, and always glad 
when the exigencies of more pressing work 
will permit me to use it. Under the name of 
"mattock" It seems to have been in use from 
time immemorial. 

Cures for seasickness are like cures for 
single life. As, according to the idealist 
view, there is but one man in the world in- 
tended for each woman, and vice versa, 
wherefore the chances are much against their 
meeting; so there is one cure for each per- 
son's mal de mer; and though he may dis- 
cern it, there is no use in recommending it, 



270 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

and after all, seasickness Is not such a terri- 
ble thing. Indeed, that way lies the true hap- 
piness of ocean travel. I do not of course 
refer to those wretched objects one sees 
dragged on deck the last day of an ocean 
voyage, looking like Lazarus in Sebastian 
del Piombo's great picture; anything may be 
overdone; and to be ill all the passage is 
overdoing it decidedly. But a quiet and 
moderate seasickness provides the chief 
requisites of happiness; something to do, 
something to think about, something to hope 
for. Such persons can always imagine how 
happy they would be if they were well, and 
when recovery comes, they are on shore ere 
the short-lived joy has passed. But the man 
who is "well", as generally considered, can- 
not get enough exercise to relieve the dull 
monotony, eats much more than is good for 
him, sleeps half the day, and so cannot sleep 
half the night, besides being puffed up with 
unholy triumph, and pernicious conceit of 
superiority over his fellow creatures. 

November 26. S. Wild geese and ducks 
going south. They do not seem to utter 
their "honk" as much as when on their north- 
ward way. Perhaps they feel ashamed of 
taking the long vacation. 

November 27. V. finished ploughing corn 
stubble. This, the largest field on the place, 
is now in good order for winter and bad 
shape for gunners. Few are they who will 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 271 

cross a muddy plowed field. They much pre- 
fer the grass lands. 

With many another craft which has disap- 
peared before the advance of progress — the 
hoy, the perigua, the jolly-boat, etc. — has 
gone the stone boat. Once no farm was 
complete without it, but I have not seen one 
for years. It was a flat sledge, made of 
three heavy planks slightly turned up at the 
front end, and strongly bolted to cross-pieces. 
It was used for drawing off heavy stones, 
much more easily got upon it than into a 
wagon, and was joyfully leaped upon by chil- 
dren. Well do I remember its screech over 
the large pebbles, its joggling roll on the 
small ones, and the beautiful wide track it 
left on soft ground. 

November 28. Plowed beet ground, 
which about terminates that kind of work 
for this fall. There has been but little mois- 
ture in the soil for a long time; but this af- 
ternoon rain began, and continued through 
the night. 

Cedars are among the most useful, and yet 
the commonest, of trees, good for every- 
thing but burning. Before a fence has been 
set many years, small red cedars will begin 
to spring up along it, deposited by the cedar- 
bird. This is a small grayish white bird with 
three or four bright yellow feathers near the 
wing-tips. They eat the berries from the 
mature cedars, then perch on the new fence, 
and the seeds spring up from their drop- 



272 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

pings. But, quickly as it starts, the cedar is 
of very slow growth; I remember one In a 
fence corner, about six feet high when I first 
knew It, which, when cut down about thirty 
years later, was not more than eighteen or 
twenty, and whereas In the first place it 
might have done for a whip, at Its end it 
was merely a sizable bean-pole. In that time 
little oaks and hickories had grown to be 
great branching trees. The cedar Is also very 
susceptible of injury from ice storms. The 
evergreen branches soon take on a load 
which bends or breaks them distinctively. 
But no tree makes better rails or posts; when 
grown in a swamp none furnishes a greater 
burden of available lumber, none has great- 
er lightness and strength; It can be used to 
the tips, and few would be more missed. 

November 2g. Rain all day. In evening 
caught chickens out of hedge where they 
have been roosting all fall. It is slow and 
prickly work, and when one is grasped by 
the leg, two are liable to go rocketing off, 
and lie concealed until morning. One took 
cover under a small bunch of asparagus, and 
was long unnoticed. 

Shakespeare's country wenches never jest. 
Why is this? He could not have considered 
women void of humor, for Beatrice and Des- 
demona will break you as pretty jests as need 
be — (and by the way, Desdemona's "chaf- 
fing" with lago Is perhaps the only scene of 
the kind between two persons of equal rank 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 273 

and different sex who were not lovers) and 
Maria's pleasantries, if not always refined, 
are sharp enough; it could not have been on 
account of the awful respect due from lowly 
to lordly, for (not to speak of the licensed 
jesters, who are free enough with their au- 
gust mistresses) Corin and Edgar, and the 
young shepherd in "Winter's Tale", mostly 
have an answer ready. But Audry, when in- 
terpolated by Touchstone, takes refuge in 
"Lord save us!" and Jaquenetta is little 
more to the point. That their sallies, if spok- 
en in keeping, would have lacked polish, one 
can well believe; but that was a point little 
afflicting Shakespeare. 

November QO. Thanksgiving. It is of- 
ten inquired why Thanksgiving was deferred 
to such a late date "long after harvest". The 
answer is that a thanksgiving is not in order 
until the crops are gathered in. In this coun- 
try maize is our principal grain, and was for 
many years the chief support of man; and 
maize is not generally harvested and housed 
through the country till near about this time, 
though wheat was reaped four months ago. 

The farmer's "killing time", is very dif- 
ferent from that of the town idler. He rises 
or rose, for this, like everything else, is com- 
ing to be done on a large scale in small quar- 
ters, broke his fast, prepared his tackle, his 
tubs of water, and his knives, not forgetting 
a couple of old iron candlesticks. Anon ap- 
peared a slouching fellow, clad in the oldest 



274 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

and foulest of garments — the professional 
*'slarterer." "Then rose to field and sky the 
wild farewell", soon happily stilled, as the 
steam circled from the barrels, and the bris- 
tles flew from the scraping of the aforesaid 
candlesticks. By afternoon, two or three 
reddish white forms hung head downwards 
from the gambrels, the once farclal sties 
were empty and gloomy, the children puffed 
and beat at the bladders, and the housewife 
exulted in the prospect of a full pork-barrel, 
that substitute erewhile for the horn of plen- 
ty. Fruition and Good Cheer, and satisfied 
Appetite, sat around the board that even- 
ing, and on the whole, the sum of rural hap- 
piness was at no term of the year more quick- 
ly increased than at "killing time". 

December i. With the passing of urgent 
labor, comes an oppressive sense of Its use- 
lessness. Many a man who is industrious in 
May and June is sluggish In December. This 
Is probably an Inheritance from a hundred 
generations of ancestors, who, having done 
all that could be done, huddled together in 
the dark and tried to keep alive till spring. 

This (Dec. i ) Is about the time of year 
we used to gather the honey. Taking a sharp 
cold morning, when the bees were numbed 
with frost, we would push a big knife all 
around the box containing "our" honey, to 
loosen the adhering wax, and pull It out from 
the upper part of the hive like a bureau 
drawer, leaving the lower story, about twice 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 275 

as large, containing the bees and "their" 
honey, say about forty pounds. Ours was 
twenty when the box was filled, which was 
not always the case; for the bees naturally 
took care of themselves, and filled the lower 
part first, before ascending by the little 8 
shaped hole, left for their convenience, into 
the attic. Looking down into the interior, 
the box removed, we could see the chilled but 
angry insects crawling over the combs, black 
with many years filling and trampling, growl- 
ing over their loss, and urging eath other to 
attack. Then would we carry away the boxes 
full of bright yellow comb, devour a part, 
and sell the rest at twenty cents a pound to 
the grocer, who would display it in large 
milk pans for the convenience of customers. 
Now, such honey as the grocer hath is set 
forth in little glass slip boxes the size of 
your hand, the bee moth has devoured work- 
er, drone, and queen, and our apiary is no 
more. 

December 2. Ran down out-roosting 
chickens in the snow. The last one caught 
was a white pullet with three black feathers 
on one side of her tail, as if she had just es- 
caped from a smutty hand. Light and ac- 
tive as it is, a fowl has no endurance, and can 
soon be overtaken and captured by an aver- 
age man. 

A goal, is, in the opinion of very many 
persons, only a thing to be aimed at from 
afar. As soon as it is nearly approached, or 



276 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

there seems a probability of striking it, ter- 
ror supervenes, and accuracy ceases. In- 
deed, I have heard it maintained that as 
soon as a goal is approached one should turn 
aside, and aim at another, beyond and dif- 
ferent from the first. The result of this 
would seem to be to convert goals into cen- 
ters of effort, rather than ends of action; 
that one should travel constantly round them 
like an athlete on the flying stride, rather 
than an archer, constantly aiming at an undy- 
ing mark. Balance is another much misap- 
plied term. Nothing, for example, can be 
done in skating without balance. The poor- 
est amateur who goes plunging along at four 
miles an hour, pitching from one foot to the 
other, has some notion of balance, or he 
could not get along at all. The more deli- 
cate feats, cutting letters, waltzing backward 
on one leg for half an hour, and the like are 
done within much smaller limits, and on 
shorter curves. 

Then comes a stage when nothing can be 
done but revolve, and then quiescence. Per- 
fect balance is inaction. 

He must be an old man who can remem- 
ber when women and girls did not skate, at 
least in this country, for Queen Mary (she 
of the Dual Reign) is said, when in Holland, 
to have skated with the Duke of Monmouth, 
following the national custom. About the 
year 1858 the fashion set in; strangely 
enough coinciding with the fullest develop- 
ment of crinoline. Well do I remember a 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 277 

small corner of the lake in Central Park be- 
ing fenced off for their use, where they could 
not be incommoded or greatly overlooked. 
This did not last long, however, and before 
the Civil War was over, female skaters cov- 
ered the entire pond. It was a great boon 
to the magazine writers of that day, and 
many an inferior tale or poem was floated 
because it contained a reference to skating. 
Nor was all such work inferior. From Theo- 
dore Winthrop's "Love on Skates" to De- 
Mille's "Lady of the Ice" some very fair 
narratives were turned out; better, perhaps, 
than any which either the bicycle or the auto- 
mobile has yet inspired. Certainly the fad, 
so to call it, lasted longer and spread further 
than "wheeling" which, as respects the skill 
and exertion required, is much on a par with 
it. 

December 5. S. Rain most of the day, tak- 
ing off the light December snow, and convey- 
ing a feeling of stepping back into the au- 
tumn. 

Which of us would step back if we could, 
from winter of life to fall, to summer, to 
spring? It is said that Gibson, the sculptor, 
was won't to state that he would live his life 
over again, if he could, right as it fell out. 
Few would do this. Many say they would 
do it, if they could have the experience of 
later years to guide them, but they forget 
that if they had experience they could not 
have hope, which is far better. Most mor- 



278 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

tals would not mind being as old as they are, 
if they were not to grow any older; and per- 
haps this state of things continues up to the 
last few weeks; that it does not continue up 
to the last hour, I am confident. Patience 
wears thin with years. We would not like 
to give up the small property, dignity, con- 
sideration which has accrued to us, to be 
guyed and ridiculed, silenced and ordered 
about, as we once were. It Is sad to be old 
and sick, but it is even sadder to be young 
and sick; we would not be the youngsters of 
i860, because we would not like the environ- 
ment, and we would not be the youngsters of 
1905, because we would not like the heredity. 

December 4, The fall has been so arid 
that the springs are not running to their ca- 
pacity, and the drains are quite dry. They 
say that winter never sets in till the springs 
fill. 

A shingly beach Is rare in this country; 
why the term shingle should be applied both 
to thin plates of wood, and a multitude of 
small round stones, doth not appear. Even 
the slope of a shingly beach Is not the same 
as that of a shingled roof; and assuredly the 
sound of water on them Is very different. 
Tennyson speaks of the "maddened scream 
of a beach dragged down by the wave", 
which undoubtedly meant a pebbled beach. 
Such Is the coast at Brighton, and other 
places in England, this peculiarity, joined 
to high English tides, gave birth to the Eng- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 279 

lish bathing machine, that wondrous con- 
struction unknown in any other country, 
which furnishes all the comforts of home 
within three feet of the breakers. Possibly 
a rocky beach if formed of soft conglomer- 
ate might in time crumble down to a shingly 
one; indeed, this may have been the case 
with the argillaceous cliffs of England, the 
chalk crumbling and washing away, and leav- 
ing the flints scattered through it to form the 
shingle. A muddy sea beach is practically 
impossible; at least, it could only exist in a 
very sheltered bay. 

December 5. Saw two gunners crossing 
the field. On my riding up and remonstrat- 
ing, one of them, locally known as "Scorp", 

threatened to blow my head off. He 

and his companion then started a rabbit, shot 
at it, and only offered in extenuation that 
they did not hit it. 

Dignity has been defined as a good thing 
to lose. And yet we all strive for it. As 
with many another article in modern times, 
we blame those who have got it and praise 
those who want to get it. We consider it 
like the manna of the Israelites, which it was 
a duty to gather, a sin to keep over night; 
only enduring when treated with the boracic 
acid of jollity. Once dignity was admired 
when stately and isolate; now it must be like 
Schooley's mountain, a good deal broader 
than high. We must get beyond the angle 
of slip; dignity nowadays has no cohesion; 



28o A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

it is sand, not clay. We must be careful to 
respect the dignity of the infant, we must be 
sedulous to abridge that of the patriarch. 
Conferring dignity is now like grading land; 
all the stut^ there is must be taken to fill in 
the hollows. And it is curious to see how 
those who would assert their insulted dignity 
do so by assuming the manners of the class 
next below them. Thus, the trespassers just 
described laid some flattering unction to their 
souls by cursing like the corner loafer, and 
the corner loafer conceives that a manly in- 
dependence is demonstrated by profuse ex- 
pectoration. 

December 6. Spent some time with a wit- 
ness in watching two gunners, one of whom 
I took to be the aforesaid "Scorp". He 
much resembled him at a distance, but as he 
drew near I saw that he had tolerably long 
hair, whereas "Scorp's" had just been cut 
very short, leaving the back of his head and 
neck white. As this was a state of things 
that could not possibly be altered, as the re- 
verse might, I listened to his loud avowals 
of indignation at "Scorp's" behavior and 
turned away. 

History is the result of desire to fix re- 
sponsibility on individuals. For good or for 
bad the king is to be held responsible. Con- 
verge all the Smithfield burnings to a point, 
call it Bloody Mary, and there you are. 
Draw the frail and slender threads of law 
and lore, in England's ninth century, to one 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 281 

bobbin, term that Alfred, and there you are 
again. To vary the metaphor, it matters not 
if the Protestant sufferers were the nuts, and 
Queen Mary the hinge of the awful crackers 
wielded by forces beyond her control or con- 
ception, so long as the hinge held, it was re- 
sponsible. The slow spinning of the threads 
aforesaid was due to many a cause; the tar- 
dy revival of ancient learning, the gradual 
spread of Christianity, the perception that 
there was something in the Moor after all, 
the consolidation of Europe; but trace them 
all to Alfred; and tuck in the ends. Espec- 
ially is this the case with the short reigns, 
wherein the monarch could not have had 
time to get matters even slightly under con- 
trol; yet Coeur de Lion and Richard III 
stand out much more sharply than Henry 
III and James I. 

December 7. Raking leaves in woods for 
litter. Though one may choose an open and 
clear-looking place, the number of sprouts 
and roots which catch and impede the rake 
is quite surprising, as is also the number of 
half decayed sticks which need removal. 
This year's leaves of course form the bulk 
of the crop, but a thin layer of last year's, 
white and skeletonized, accompany them, 
only these two seasons old being thoroughly 
incorporated with the soil. Perhaps this 
would be different in a damper year. 

But a few inches separate our toes and 
heels, yet how different their nature and re- 



282 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

pute. The toes are despised and contempti- 
ble; they have neither duties nor rights. To 
"have one's toes trodden on" Is an Injury so 
pitiful that it has passed Into a proverb for 
wounded conceit. "Tip-toe" suggests strain- 
ing or spying. But the heel has majesty and 
mystery. "The Iron heel of power" treads 
all down; on the heels were fixed the knightly 
spurs, first badge of honor. Achilles' vulner- 
able heel saved him. Wholly Impregnable, 
he had been utterly impossible; that one 
weak point conquers Hector, silences Agam- 
emnon, loves Patroclus, yields to Priam. 
Emerson has said that the woods seem to 
wait until we have passed through; this is 
but another rendering of the good or evil 
genius who treads so close on our heels that 
we can never see him; did we turn quickly 
enough, he is there. The Chinese perhaps 
realized the absurdity of toes when they 
tried to get rid of them by foot-binding. 
Even the most familiar phrases never bring 
the heel into contempt. "Cooling the heels", 
"down at heel", only indicate the delays and 
shabbiness which may wait on genius or hero- 
ism, while "a clean pair of heels" spells 
flight, It is true, but successful flight. 

December 8. Raking leaves on lawn. Un- 
less this Is done shortly after rain, it is dif- 
ficult to make them stick together, and they 
have to be picked up between two pieces of 
board. When pulled together with the horse- 
rake, as is sometimes done, innumerable 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 283 

leaves become threaded on each tooth like a 
string of dried apples. Light, abundant, and 
valuable as leaves are, there Is nothing hard- 
er to gather or store and nothing so seldom 
used as manure. 

With winter comes, or used to come, the 
wolf. Probably It Is not over two hundred 
years since a large part of the civilized 
world stood In annual dread of him. It Is 
strange that man's best and closest friend 
among animals should be so nearly allied to 
his most hated foe. For hatred has ever 
been the portion of the wolf. No good (ex- 
cept only the Romulus and Remus affair) Is 
ever told of him, no saving clause admitted 
for his benefit. The Hon Is supposed to pos- 
sess generosity, the tiger, beauty; the bear, 
clumsy good nature; the wolf has none of 
these, but Is malevolent, hideous, cowardly, 
and cruel as the grave. "The wolf at the 
door" suggests fear beyond that Induced by 
any other creature, the "seawolf" Is terror 
Incarnate. Though he is so much larger and 
more valuable, the bear lingers In the back 
settlements beyond the wolf; the Eastern 
States know Lupus no more. King Edgar 
slew the last wolf In England. Cameron of 
Lochlel the last in Scotland; perhaps Colum- 
bia's last Is reserved to fall by the hand of 
T. R. 

December g. Light rain. By this time of 
year, the roads are generally frozen enough 
to haul up salt hay. Many years ago coming 



284 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

from the Island Farm with such a load, we 
overtook a party at the foot of a short, 
steep Icy hill whose team had become quite 
discouraged, and who was waiting for some- 
thing to happen. Hitching our team before 
his, we rushed him to the top of the hill. He 
departed, saying by way of thanks that he 
was one of that kind that never gave up. 

With winter begins the hewing of wood — 
not an unpleasant task, under moderately 
favorable conditions. Bitter winds and deep 
snow can never be pleasant to work in — 
and I have cut wood when I could hardly 
keep my grip on the axe-helve for the ice 
which formed upon it, when mustache and 
beard froze together, and I had to make a 
clearing at the foot of every tree. But in 
sharp calm weather — when 

"The white chips played about my blade, 
In wood that baffled wind and storm", 

above all, when felling green timber, not the 
iron-like dead white oak, or the withered 
hickory which will throw no chip, the labor 
is so congenial that one sometimes wishes 
for the traditional chunk of frozen bean por- 
ridge, which might avert the necessity of go- 
ing home to dinner. Chopping does not heat 
one up quickly, any more than sowing; it can 
be kept at by the hour, speaking in reason, 
yet for some cause it, more than field labor, 
occupies the mind, which is not so often left 
to chew upon a curtailed text, or a long for- 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 285 

gotten proverb. A half cord of split wood 
is a smaller, but more conspicuous record 
than a half acre of turned sod; and if only 
the trees were more resigned to their fate, 
and would not pitch and lodge upon one an- 
other, the sport were not half bad. 

December 10. S. Witch hazel is now in 
full blossom, and its dull yellow petals are 
to be seen along banks of streams and other 
damp places, not unlike the spice-bush in 
early spring. This uncanny and unseasona- 
ble blooming caused its reputation as the 
"chosen wood" of witches and incantations, 
the last remains of which, enduring to near 
our time, is the belief that a forked twig of 
witch hazel will indicate a spring. 

What majesty was wont to hedge about 
preparations for sleep I How various its 
paraphernalia ! There was the ascend-du-lit, 
as if for assumption of a real throne. There 
were the posts and the tester, the curtains 
and the valance, the warming-pan and the 
night-cap. Now all these are cast aside, the 
feather-bed, the old linen sheets with threads 
smooth and durable as wire, pass away. I 
can well remember, when visiting ancient rel- 
atives in my childhood, how stately and cere- 
monious were the preparations for slumber, 
an "twere a holy solemnity." First the inten- 
tion of retiring was announced, not as now, 
"Guess it's time tergoter bed", but with for- 
mal gravity. Shams and counterpanes were 
removed; curtains drawn back; light shaded 



286 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

or turned down; nocturnal refreshments pre- 
pared. Something like an hour would be oc- 
cupied in these preliminaries, before the final 
disrobing and couching. Now we sleep on 
metal mattresses, upon metal frames, In as 
airy and disconnected a manner as possible; 
nay, many of us do not sleep in rooms at all. 
The glory of the bedroom has departed to 
the bathroom, which, once a scarcely decent 
adjunct, Ignored as far as possible, has now 
become the most expensive and frequented 
apartment in the house. 

December 1 1. It should seem that the R. 
R. Company's plan Is to get an estimate 
from you of the least sum you will take for 
their crossing your land at the point you 
prefer, pretend to go there, then revert to 
their original plan, and refuse to pay you 
any more, saying that you had named your 
figure. Another plan is to get permission to 
erect one pole, then make it fifteen, giving 
the owner the right to cut them down on six- 
ty days notice, and If he attempts this, pun- 
ish him for obstructing the telegraph. 

December 12. Turned back two gunners, 
one of whom inquired if I did not think It 
was mean of me to do so. Another Informed 
me with vehemence that'd he'd shoot any 
man that shot his dog, and then, to prove his 
own extraordinary virtue, stated that he nev- 
er killed any one's chickens. 

A recent anecdote runs thus, showing the 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 287 

slight esteem in which memory is held. 

*'Mrs. A. 'How do you do, Mrs. B. So 
delighted. And how is your dear little girl?' 

"Mrs. B. 'My httle boy is quite well, 
thank you.' 

"Mrs. A. 'Ah, yes, boy, to be sure, I knew 
it was one or the other.' " 

Here Mrs. A. tried to save her discern- 
ment at the expense of her memory. Of 
course, she failed, and that egregiously; but 
she would never have tried to save her mem- 
ory at the expense of her discernment. Mem- 
ory is the oldest, most useful, and least es- 
teemed of all the faculties. "The Mother 
of the Muses", like many another mother 
with a host of fair daughters, she meets with 
few civilities. Nobody is ashamed of con- 
fessing to a bad memory. How often do we 
hear the remark, accompanied by a smirk of 
pride, "If I could remember all the books 
I've read, I should be so-and-so", but how 
few say "If I had read all the books I re- 
member wishing to read, it were well with 
me". We gather up memory in youth, bear 
it along in maturity, drop it piecemeal in old 
age. It may be doubted whether it exists at 
all beyond this life; in Paradise it were a 
well nigh useless adjunct, in the Inferno the 
never dying worm. 

December /j. A fowl's clack nearby and 
a gunner's call to his dog far off, are very 
much alike in sound. 

With cold weather the animals are mostly 



288 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

put on half-time, and this induces restless- 
ness. Many a horse who would be only too 
glad to stand still in his stall after a hard 
day's work will weave and pull when idling. 
On many a night now rises the anxious in- 
quiry, "What's the noise at the barn?" and 
follows the sleepy reply, "One of the horses 
is loose". Stronger halters must be had, not 
only in the stall, but on the street. A horse 
can break anything you can tie him with, 
and so one must consider what he had better 
break. If he is inclined to pull, do not tie 
him by the bit; if he drops that out of his 
mouth by breaking billet or check-strap, all 
control is lost. Draw your tie-strap through 
the bit-ring, and buckle it around his neck, 
then he is aware of some pull on his mouth, 
yet if he breaks the strap the bridle remains; 
you have something in reserve; there is safe- 
ty in double rule. Herein lay the rigor and 
the weakness of Theocracy; there was but 
one law, and when that was broken, naught 
remained; it included all; trespass, murmur, 
curiosity, indolence, were punished as severe- 
ly as murder or adultery; who offended in 
one point, was guilty of all; the runaway 
must be felled instantly, lest worse ensue. 
Whereas under modern co-existence of civil 
and religious rule, a man might break every 
mooring of loyalty to the king, yet swing at 
anchor, a faithful son of the Church. 

December 14. Poke-weed drying and 
falling. The stem full of slightly connected, 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 289 

porous disks, like big wafers. The largest 
of our herbs. In south grows 12 or 14 feet 
high, like the mustard plant in the Scriptures 
"The fowls of the air lodged in it". 

The youth is necessitated to find beauty 
somewhere around him. If his neighbor- 
hood is pretty, he admires it; if common- 
place, he embellishes it; if ugly, he trans- 
forms it. A muddy pool will reflect the sun- 
set; a barren mound will furnish that near 
horizon which, for the moment, satisfies de- 
sire. An old man, revisiting the haunts of 
his youth, shall wonder at the glamour which 
made Arden of the scrubby woodlot, and 
Paradises of the briery fields. A girl crosses 
his way, is she fair? That is as it should be. 
Is she plain, silly, and rude? His imagina- 
tion breaks away and produces maidens of 
her stature and age, but permeated with the 
beauty which must be, shall be there. He 
gazes through a netted telescope which 
strains out all he would not see; the best only 
is apparent to him. Thus he knows sorrow 
only by its relief, and distance by return, and 
loss by hope, and penury by generosity, and 
takes all things cast forcibly to earth on the 
rebound. 

December 75. Cold morning. A light 
snow began to fall about noon, and we 
brought the cows in from grass. They have 
been pastured unusually late this year, the 
season generally ending a month earlier. 
Grass is little good after frost has bitten it. 



290 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

but this season he has spared It. 

About this time we begin feeding stalks to 
the cows. As long as grass is green they 
care battle for such fodder; but with the fall 
of heavy frost they turn to "stover", as one 
may imagine a man bereft of society turning 
• to dry books. At first we give them the 
smaller and fresher bundles, which they eat 
up pretty clean; but ere long we come to the 
big coarse bunches, and the feed-cutter must 
be brought into play. This is a tapering 
trough on legs, with an iron collar at one end, 
and a large knife, hinged at one end and han- 
dled at the other, sliding across its end. In- 
to this miniature guillotine the stalks are 
thrust, and pushed along with the left hand, 
while the right, holding the knife, cuts them 
into six, four or three-inch lengths. These 
the cows will eat, except the larger and 
coarser bits, which are flung under their feet 
for litter. There is supposed to be much 
danger of cutting one's fingers oft with the 
above machine, and many are the admoni- 
tions anent it addressed to beginners, but the 
only wound I ever knew inflicted by it was on 
a young man who, stooping suddenly in the 
dark, struck his nose on the back of the 
knife. 

December i6. Sawing wood — a seasona- 
ble task. Our neighbor R., who burns a 
great deal of wood, always has a stack sea- 
soning behind his bouse, and always in Feb- 
ruary what remains of the last year's wood 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 291 

is piled over close to the door, to make room 
for the new cut. For two seasons now he 
has had the sawing done by a traveling en- 
gine, leaving only the splitting for hand 
work. 

Great was the discovery that instead of 
rubbing the blade back and forth, upon the 
rock, tlie rock could be revolved under the 
blade. Then sharpening became ceaseless, 
and not intermittent; then it could be done 
with much more delicacy and exactness. 
Then, moreover, it became a partnership, 
"One to turn and one to hold", has been the 
rule for uncounted ages ; which has the bet- 
ter, he who crouches and propels, or he who 
stands and steers? I'he one turns, and turns, 
and douses water, the other holds, and holds 
and sends forth fire. Some men, gifted in 
little else, have marvelous skill in putting on 
an edge; such was McClellan; others would 
far rather use the blade than sharpen it; 
such was Pyrrhus. Franklin's purchaser, 
who preferred the speckled axe, was very 
like Franklin himself; one may toil too much 
after polish. In days of yore, my brother 
held and I turned; and as I swayed to ^nd 
fro, counting the revolutions and wonder- 
ing if a thousand more would do it, I was 
wont to chant a quatrain from Punch — 

"If I'd been a Pardner in a Bank, 
I shouldn't be workin' at this here crank; 
I wish it had been 'arf a million Pound, 
And I shouldn't be turnin' this 'andle 
round." 



292 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

December ij, S. The great advance In 
learning might be shown by a slight altera- 
tion of the text to "Many papers shall blow 
to and fro". They are to be seen tangled In 
every farm fence and every suburban hedge. 
To keep things decent one must go up and 
down the roads at times thrusting the papers 
Into ruts with a spade. 

To bring truth home to the hearts of men, 
forcibly yet conveniently, has ever been the 
aim of the good and wise; yet immense diffi- 
culties Inhered. If presented, not in Its en- 
tirety — no man can do that — but in large 
masses, it was at once too ponderous and too 
vague for reception; if cut into small chips, 
it gave no fair sample, and did no lasting 
good. It was long ago discovered that dra- 
matic impersonation — that is, the bringing 
of Mahomet to the mountain — went far to 
solve the problem. Create your disciples — 
make them walk, and talk, and act — bring 
them face to face with your doctrine, and 
give each the portion convenient for him, so 
shall all men learn from the spectacle of dis- 
tribution. Here lay Shakespeare's eminence. 
Others have delivered their message as vital- 
ly and melodiously, a few still more so; If 
none have embodied their audience so well, 
some have approximated; but he has often- 
est fitted the burden to the strength, fed each 
with food meet for him, whereby he might 
prosper after his kind; he, of all dramatists, 
best combined the guide and the purveyor. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 293 

December 18. The wrist is that joint 
which wrenches or twists. E. G. Wring, 
wry, wried. "If the dear host's neck were 
wried". Browning. The key used by old time 
harpers to tune their instruments was called 
a wrest. What connection has this with the 
Chaucerian sense of "cover"? "Thy body to 
wrie", "And he was all over wrien", etc. 

December ig. Examining a swollen red- 
dish swelling on an alder stem growing at 
the pond's edge, I was surprised to find that 
what I had taken for a peeled spot of bark 
was merely a ring of last fall's dodder, still 
preserving its rusty yellow color, while ap- 
parently the constriction of its slender stem 
had sufficed to leave a very perceptible bunch 
in the tough shrub. 

December 20. The green cutters begin to 
appear. A nice grove of young pines has 
been pretty well done up by them, though the 
ice storm assisted. Years ago, I found a man 
there with a hatchet, who Immediately began 
with suspicious vehemence to denounce those 
fellows who went round choppin' trees. 

December 21. K. told about finding three 
chickens drowning in a pail, while the hen 
was drinking the water. 

There is a story of a woman who made it 
her boast that she had used the same clothes 
line for twenty years. Of course this could 
only be done by constant and careful hous- 



294 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

Ing; always exposed to weather, It would not 
have lasted twenty weeks; clotheslines must 
not be tarred. Some people are irritated by 
anecdotes like the above, and say that the 
fraying out of the woman's nerves and 
health was much worse than the fraying out 
of her rope. But this is not a necessary al- 
ternative ; close attention to detail may dwell 
under the same roof with breadth of vision. 
Mary Lyon said "Take an extended view, 
look at the whole," but Mary Lyon saved 
her clothes-lines, figuratively if not actually. 
Whereas Mrs. Slacque, who lets everything 
go, and whose favorite rejoinder is, "I sup- 
pose more can be bought", wastes away her 
senses and health in mildewing gossip and 
searching bargain sales. 

December 22. Set new gate post, a big 
half ton affair, four feet deep. We jammed 
it in place with stones, to shift some of which 
I had to rest on my head and knees, and lift 
with my hands. 

The Greeks joined material and execution 
as near perfection as the earth has seen. The 
Egyptians excelled in colossal monoliths; the 
Romans' strong point was their mortar. Ce- 
mented by this, it mattered not what com- 
posed their wall — stones, tiles, brick-bats, 
potsherds — all were made one in that won- 
derful fusion. And so may a great purpose, 
a strong belief, a gallant spirit, a clear vi- 
sion, form and weld together talents the 
most diverse, or faculties of the feeblest. 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 295 

The unskilled cobbler, the poor camel-driv- 
er, gained a greater following than Bacon or 
Crichton; Bayard leads more than Bourbon, 
Thoreau sees further than Linnoens. Nay, 
the belief may be stronger than the person- 
ality. Who has not seen some remnant of 
dilapidation, the bricks broken across, the 
mortar holding the fragments together? 
Such is everyone who will die for his princi- 
ples, or his faith, or his honor, or his reputa- 
tion. 

To double is not to increase. 

''Make thy friend a spectacle", says Em- 
erson; but there are some who make their 
friend a pair of spectacles, and only find hap- 
piness in seeing through him. 

December 2j. The shooting season is 
nearly over. The boys, the more or less 
skillful gunners, and the toughs who think 
they are gunners, have almost disappeared. 
But now and then a clerkly looking man goes 
by, seemingly on indifferent terms with his 
gun. 

December 24. S. Had barbed wire ex- 
*sted in the olden time dragons would have 
made their nests of it. What island most sug- 
gests matrimony? Celebes in search of a 
wife. "Medio de fonte leporum, surgit 
amari aliquid" freely translated, "In the 
midst of the rabbit's spring, bobs the lover's 
lemonade". 



296 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

December 25. There has been no snow 
as yet, which is one reason gunners are so 
frequent, as they have not been held up by 
the law prohibiting the tracking of game in 
snow. 

Christmas may warm the heart, but it nips 
the fingers and toes. Years ago, before trol- 
leys were, we went fourteen miles in an open 
sleigh, to visit our relatives, returning crea- 
tures of the drift, our sleigh as full of snow 
as if that had been what we went for, our 
tracks instantly effaced by the whirling 
storm. Even when we got home toil was not 
over, for after beating life into our fingers 
we had to knock the balls out of the horses' 
feet and comb the ice out of their manes. It 
was only one degree better than riding in a 
storm, for then the ice gets into the saddle 
and stirrups. 

Dr. Johnson was no equestrian. His bulky 
figure and his slender means alike disquali- 
fied him for the exercise. On two occasions 
only do we find him mounted; once, on his 
wedding day, when he had the memorable 
argument with his bride, ad ungulam; and 
in the Hebrides, when Boswell, anxious for 
once to direct affairs, had got him upon a 
Highland sheltie; yet he liked swift motion; 
he is said to have declared that being whirled 
through the country in a post-chaise was the 
height of felicity. How he would have en- 
joyed motoring! How comfortably he would 
have lolled in the cushioned tonneau of a 
machine up to even his ponderous weight! 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 297 

How brusquely would he have silenced the 
"foppish lamentations" of those his compan- 
ions who objected to a dash of rain; and how 
speciously would he have argued touching 
the destruction of a heedless chicken. "Sir, 
if we may roast and eat a fowl for the titilla- 
tion of our palates, I see not but we may run 
him down for the intensification of our pleas- 
ure, but we ought to pay his owner, or itMs 
sad work.". 

December 26. Several blue jays in a bush, 
the mild weather has kept them North, or at 
any rate made them show more abroad. I 
imagine they never go very far South of this. 

A Compliment is a Complement with its 
waist slightly pinched; it is something be- 
longing to your friend; to with-hold it is to 
with-hold his due; it fills him out properly; 
won't leave him gibbous? That pretty 
speech, that graceful action, have waited un- 
til now for thee to utter or perform. Be not 
perturbed; assure thyself, Chesterfield nor 
Voltaire could do it better. Timeliness is 
all; could Saul have understood Praed, or 
Regulus Moore? Strike while the iron is 
hot; fear not for scorching of fingers; cele- 
rity shall serve better than raw-hide gloves. 
Flattery is made of other stuff; it is extrane- 
ous and forced; the Deux ex machina, who 
should appear from a cloud. "Lay it on with 
a trowel", as Disraeli said, it remains rough- 
cast; stucco at best; peeling hopelessly. Frost 
or shower, even the wear and tear of daily 



298 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

routine, will soon be its undoing; but a com- 
pliment, once lodged, remains a possession 
for life. 

December 2y, Neighbor K. suggests that 
it were well if tramps were made to carry 
passes, as negroes used to do in days of yore. 

Coming one day between Xmas and New 
Year along the street in a sleigh, myself and 
a neighbor on the front seat, my wife and 
father behind, I was suddenly aware of a 
runaway horse with an empty sleigh rushing 
out of a side avenue, and coming straiglit for 
me on the wrong side of the street, looking 
as big as a house. I pulled away from the 
snow-bank, but our horse was only slightly 
turned from his track when the other was 
upon us, with a crash that burst everything 
loose. Steadied by the reins at the moment 
of impact, I kept my place; but my wife flew 
from her seat as our sleigh performed a 
quarter-circle backward, and fell right in the 
track of the runaway, who, pierced to the 
heart by our shaft, made a great leap over 
her, fell spouting gore, and died in a few mo- 
ments. One thought occupied my mind: 
"How did she get in front of me when she 
was behind me?" Meanwhile our horse, find- 
ing himself loose, performed a gambol or 
tv/o, and then stood looking inquiringly 
about until he was wanted again. The oth- 
er's shaft had only picked a little skin from 
his shoulder. Never before did I realize so 
well how one party in a tournament might be 



A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 299 

spitted, the other go unscathed. 

December 28. Riding this afternoon, 
could hear the squirrels scampering through 
the dry leaves on both sides of the road. 
They are very vigilant and active now from 
nearly forty days pursuit by gunners; but 
their close time is near at hand. It is said 
that a great many wild fowl did not go South 
at all this winter. 

December 2g. Working at filling a wash- 
out this morning, observed a large flock of 
gulls (who seldom are seen here in number) 
wheeling and turning against a dark cloud, 
their wings catching the light like silver or 
glass. At one moment they would disappear 
entirely, and then flash out again, as they 
came broadside to the sun's rays. The day 
was like April, mild and balmy. 

December jo. Helplessness and omnipo- 
tence are alike sacred; the busiest person liv- 
ing is the devil. 

December J7. S. The weather has been 
exceptionally warm and calm; never more 
worthy to be called "halcyon days". 

We are judged by the average; it is Over- 
Brahma; at once the doubter and the doubt, 
the justice and the scales. Average, as its 
name implies, is not the truth; but it is sing- 
ularly like it. You can prove nothing against 
an average; you can claim anything for it. 



300 A FARMER'S NOTE BOOK 

It is immune, ever-inoculated, Mithidates 
among poisons. It is the king who can do 
no wrong, the court of final appeal. We 
despise it until it overwhelms us; no lance 
was ever laid in rest against it, many a one 
has it broken. It is like Mont Blanc, tower- 
ing above all men's heads, trodden under 
foot of individuals. "What dost thou here?" 
says the doughty champion; striding forth in 
the pride of his youth. "Fall on us, and pro- 
tect us", cry the defeated and the prostrate. 
It is the inexhaustible foundation of all things; 
base in both senses; incapable of progress or 
retreat. Fringed with uncertainty, it alone 
stands poised, bringing us to torture, insur- 
ing us against ruin. It is the ally of the un- 
reasonable, the destruction of the unwary; 
in youth it is the Pons Asinorum ; in age it is 
Al Sirat. 



JUN 26 1912 



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